will this alignment setup help increase my tires life?

[AndyH]

factory spec from FAQs said
front toe: -3.5mm +/- 1mm
rear toe: 3mm

but my alignment sheet gave me in degree......anyone knows the conversion?
2nd question: what's the Thrust angle? The guy said my thrust angle is at 0 so my tires will wear out evenly. is this true?

I know that my camber is off cuz the car is lower

Andy

 

[prova4re]

Is your camber -3 in the rear?
If it is that is what is going to eat up your tires, mine is at -2 and I think that is bad. I only get 8000km to a rear set.

 

[nis350]

factory spec from FAQs said
front toe: -3.5mm +/- 1mm
rear toe: 3mm

but my alignment sheet gave me in degree......anyone knows the conversion?
2nd question: what's the Thrust angle? The guy said my thrust angle is at 0 so my tires will wear out evenly. is this true?

I know that my camber is off cuz the car is lower

Andy [/B][/QUOTE]

I did the same thing as you, except I was able to set the rear camber to -2.3(L) and -2.2(R). I have eibach on mine and mine is white also.

One thing interesting was that they have this device that pushed up the car first (on the aligment ramp) and spin the wheels to measure something. Then the car is lower back for the actual aligment. I think that is normal procedures except I am not sure the car would be sitting at normal ride height. If it is not sitting at normal ride height, that would mean the aligment would be off with the normal ride height.

 

[Gerard van Santen]

but my alignment sheet gave me in degree......anyone knows the conversion?

Andy,

6 mm is about 0.80 degree

Gerard

 

[Gerard van Santen]

2nd question: what's the Thrust angle? The guy said my thrust angle is at 0 so my tires will wear out evenly. is this true?

Thrust angle is the direction that the rear wheels are pointing in relation to the center line of the vehicle. If the thrust angle is not zero, then the vehicle will "dog track" and the steering wheel will not be centered. The best solution is to first adjust the rear toe to the center line and then adjust the front toe. This is normally done during a 4-wheel alignment as long as the rear toe is adjustable. If the rear is not adjustable, then the front toe must be set to compensate for the thrust angle, allowing the steering to be centered.

Gerard

 

[NSX-2004/074]

In the interest of tire wear - which side of the alignment specifications should I ask them to adjust for? I seem to be on track to to get about 8,000 miles from the OEM rear tires, which appears to be about average.

And, are the alignment specifications the same for 2002+?

Finally, does adjusting the alignment actually help with tire wear? Since I purchased my 2004 with only 2,800 miles on it, I'm assuming it has the factory alignment settings front and rear.

Thanks,
Dave

 

[mickeylex]

In the interest of tire wear - which side of the alignment specifications should I ask them to adjust for?
I seem to be on track to to get about 8,000 miles from the OEM rear tires, which appears to be about average.

Have them adjust to the minimum of the range (minimum camber, minimum toe). You can go even less, but the added tire life isn't really worth the performance tradeoff.
8K miles out of the rears is pretty good tire wear.

And, are the alignment specifications the same for 2002+?

Yes, the alignment specs for 2002+ are the same for other years. The spec was revised in 1993 and hasn't changed since.

Finally, does adjusting the alignment actually help with tire wear? Since I purchased my 2004 with only 2,800 miles on it, I'm assuming it has the factory alignment settings front and rear.
Thanks,
Dave

Yes, adjusting the alignment to less agressive does help w/ tire wear some. You can adjust to minimum spec or even go lower than spec and improve tire wear. How much will you improve? Can't say - depends your driving style. For me, I try to keep it somewhere between middle and minimum spec.

 

[titaniumdave]

Toe causes tire wear. Reduce it to as little as you can stand and your tires will last longer. Toe makes your tires scrape along the pavement, erasing the rubber as you go...

Toe also sets up forces in the suspension which counteracts the input the road surface has on the steering, making the car track straight down the road and not 'wander'. It will also 'pre-tension' the tires so the car will turn in quicker, so there will be a lose of crispness to initial turn in if you reduce toe numbers.

I run -0.1 degree total toe on the front, 0.1 degree total toe on the rear and my tires last very well, even with -3 degrees camber in the front and -2.6 degrees camber on the rear.

 

[nsxtasy]

Toe causes tire wear. Reduce it to as little as you can stand and your tires will last longer. Toe makes your tires scrape along the pavement, erasing the rubber as you go...

Yup. In terms of millimeters, the original alignment spec for the rear was 6 mm. When owners complained (and sued ) about rapid tire wear, they changed the recommendation to 4 mm. (As noted above, they did this in 1993, but made it retroactive to all model years.) You can reduce it further, to 2 mm or even zero, for greater tire wear, at the expense of a slight degradation in handling.

 

[NSX-2004/074]

Excellent, thank you all for the responses. I'm not sure I have the ability to notice the change in handling performance (yet). Spirited runs on the Tail of the Dragon are as far as we've gone so far.

As far as improved tire wear - I'll post back in 8,000 miles or so with the results. That should be sometime in May at the rate we're going.

-Dave