coquito icey truck ! damn i miss those !

 

Looks like you guys need rear camber kits too.

That neighborhood looks similar to mine.

 

looks like a productive time. nice break time. i want sweet gloves like ian too.

 

+1.........

 

like the ones we already have installed


seans numbers for the front were worse than his stock numbers... we were wondering if we need to get those hub spacers

 

dont forget some rear toe bolts. you'll chew through tires even faster with high toe like that.

 

these are my current numbers..when b2auto installed the rear arms they didnt drill out the extra space for toe bolts

 

Here are my pictures...

It was a good time and definitely a learning experience for all who came out and helped wrenching on the cars. Big thanks to Shawn who hosted the get together at his house and for supplying the food and drink.

Chris attempting at putting back in his stock shifter to replace the enjuku short shifter. Didn't go as planned as the plastic gromits that connect the shifter to the transmission were broken due to prior uninstall. We'll get it back in there next time:




Max is quite adept at doing the door actuator fix (it took about 40 minutes for him to do it) and repaired Veronica's doors. Here's some pics of him at work:


V was adamant at helping any way she could so here she is putting back the door internals and accidentally hiding the wire we needed to tap into...lol



How many people does it take to put back together a G35 door panel anyway?




All fixed up and put back together and V gave it the key fob test and it worked out good:



Next up was Max's install of his Motordyne plenum spacer and aramid gaskit.



Max works so fast not even the human eye can track his movements:


I helped so much by putting a microfiber towel over the lower intake holes so no birds/bugs/monsters would fly into the engine bay while we had the upper and lower plenums off:


Here's Max twirling the lower plenum around like a pizza:


Dirty:


Cleaned up throttle body and inside upper plenum:


Here is a picture of the stock control arms compared to the Ichiba control arm. Similar yet different from the SPC camber kit that I have on my car...



Here's Shawn doing most of the install work. It was quite a learning experience for both of us putting the Ichiba kit, but it definitely wasn't as hard as we thought it would be:


Random pics:




The prior owner to Shawn's house left some metal screws cemented into the garage floor that they never removed. Max cut them to pieces because he can:



Unfortunately, that's all the pics I took. The course of progression that day was Max did the door actuator fix to V's car, we put on Max's plenum spacer, we put on the Ichiba kit on Shawn's car first, then on Max's car. We started round 11AM. I left around 9:30pm from Shawn's house. Thanks to V, Max, Chris, Dan for coming and Shawn for hosting this and making it happen.

Thanks Shawn!

 

lol nice pix Ian... it was fun!

 

I'd like to see Shawn's spec sheet and compare them with your's. They were able to get his rear in spec but his fronts were worse than stock.

That sheet you're showing, Max...did Firestone elongate the toe bolt holes for you that day similar to what is done for the SPC kit? Strange that it didn't help any if they did...

For anyone wondering we used a combination of Sean Gilley thread on how he put in his SPC camber kit and a youtube video to install the ichiba kit since it didn't come with any directions in the box (it didn't come with the wheel hub spacer or brake spacer like the SPC kit either).

Here's the youtube link on how to install an SPC camber kit:

 

Yea, thanks again to Chris, Ian, Max, Veronica, and Dan for making this a success. We got a lot accomplished, learned a lot, and had fun doing it. Can't wait til we can do this again!

As for the camber issues, here's what I've learned. Especially after doing some research today.

Max and I have a very similar set up. We're both dropped on Tein 350Z S-Tech lowering springs. We both have the front and rear ichiba camber arms installed. We installed the fronts during this "install day" at my house. The only real difference is the wheels. I have the 19" stockers, and he has 20" MRR's which are bigger and wider, which apparently has an effect on alignment, as well.

First, here's the factory recommended specs for camber and toe...

Front:
Camber min: -1.17
Camber nominal: -0.42
Camber max: +0.33

Toe min: 0.00
Toe nominal: 0.04
Toe max: 0.08

Rear:
Camber min: -1.75
Camber nominal: -1.25
Camber max: -0.75

Toe min: 0.00
Toe nominal: 0.12
Toe max: 0.23

My specs are as follows...

2 Weeks after lowering springs were installed, with stock camber arms (F&R)...

Front:
Camber left: -1.8 (out of range)
Camber right: -1.6 (out of range)

Toe left: 0.03 (near nominal)
Toe right: 0.04 (nominal)

Rear:
Camber left: -1.6 (in range, but low)
Camber right: -1.7 (in range, but low)

Toe left: 0.13 (near nominal)
Toe right: 0.12 (nominal)

My toe is good front and rear. Camber is low in the rears, but in range. Front camber is out of range (too low). Front camber arms cannot be adjusted without replacing with aftermarket. BTW, when I say "low" i mean negative. The actual number is bigger, but it's negative camber we're talking about.

It's widely accepted that if you have negative camber, that's not too bad for tire wear, as long as your toe is good. But I want perfection! So I bought Ichiba camber kits for front and rear.

I installed the rear arms by myself earlier this week. And Saturday, I installed the front arms with the help of these guys! Thanks again! So, the day after Max and I both got an alignment at the same shop. Here's my results...

Front:
Camber left: -1.7
Camber right: -1.9

Toe left: 0.05
Toe right: 0.04

Rear:
Camber left: -1.1
Camber right: -1.2

Toe left: 0.20 (w/o rear toe bolts installed)
Toe right: 0.16 (w/o rear toe bolts installed)

So as you can see, there's virtually no improvement over stock numbers for the fronts. Rears are better, and can be perfect once I get the toe bolts installed. They're in spec, anyways.

What's interesting is that when we installed the front arms, the camber "setting" we used looked to be dead center. The numbers before they aligned it were considerably more negative than stock: -2.6 and -2.8. The front Ichiba camber arms only allow for a smaller range of adjustment. More importantly, they appear to be designed to allow for more negative camber, for handling purposes I suppose. When maxed out, they only got me near to my original stock numbers. Thus, they don't appear to be designed to give enough positive camber adjustment for someone dropped a decent amount. They claim up to 3 degrees of adjustment, but they also say it's based on how much you're dropped.

The SPC front camber kit includes hub spacers which provide a static (unadjustable) positive camber. That plus the adjustable ball joint on the arm itself seems to be what someone would need for my kinda of set up. Unfortunately, the Ichiba front kit, which doesn't come with the spacers (or shims, as they are called), doesn't provide enough positive camber to get back in range or to nominal.

So I am (and Max too, I suppose) faced with a couple options...

1) Deal with the specs as is. Toe is okay, and that's what really eats up tires.

2) Uninstall the front arms and go back to stock. Numbers will probably be about the same, but still not nominal.

3) Try to return/sell the Ichiba arms and get SPC arms (and install them).

4) Try to buy the spacers/shims by themselves and add them to the Ichiba set up. Think anyone would sell them? It seems there are quite a few people who install the SPC arms without the shims.

Lots to think about, but I've certainly learned a lot. But for those of you who are going to drop your cars, know that first of all, each car is different. And secondly, depending on what you want your alignment numbers to be, and how much you're dropped, will determine your decision on what camber kit (if any) to get. If you want/need a decent amount of positive camber adjustment, don't get the Ichiba front arms. The rears, though, seem to be fine for me. But Max, on the other hand, seems to be out of range, still. But his rear wheels and tires are bigger than mine.

 

The mod day looks like what we used to have at my house and Chucky's house a few years ago. Looks like a lot of fun.

The Ichiba arms look to be an exact copy of the Cusco arms. If so, the SPCs have more positive adjustment without the spacers than the Cuscos. That's a problem for lowered cars and the Cuscos have more positive camber adjustment than negative adjustment, and it appears from the photos that the Ichibas are the same.

However, I would expect the final alignment numbers to be better in the front. Chucky has 350Z S-techs and the Cusco arms and his camber in the front is not very negative.

You may be able to get the SPC hub spacers from someone who did not install them. Post up a WTB in the suspension section of the marketplace. Also contact Peter at IAP to see about buying just the hub spacers.

Also. look at the factory camber specs. There is about a degree of camber that is acceptable to be within range. Just because the alignment number may be "within specs" doesn't mean you're not going to wear out the insides of the tires. An inch of drop will increase negative camber by about -8 degrees. That's a lot of leeway. As an example, my stock sedan alignment was within specs but wore the insides of the tires down to the threads. Ask W0ady about his G35 alignment too. It was the same thing.

Negative camber has more to do with worn insides of the tires than I think is realized. When getting the alignment, you must tell the person doing the alignment that you want the alignment numbers to be as close as possible to 0 to prevent tire wear. If you get a lazy alignment tech, they are going to stop adjusting as soon as the alignment gets within spec, which may not be what you want.

The wheel diameter doesn't have much to do with the camber differences. If you both have the proper size tires, meaning the same outside diameter as stock tires, then any difference should be no different than aligning a new tire vs. a more worn tire.

If the Ichiba rear toe bolts are copies of the SPC toe bolts, then the hole needs to be elongated to work properly.

 

i think toe is more important than camber when it comes to tire wear. for street driving, you want your toe as close to 0 as possible. -1 or -2 camber isnt that bad. i still get about 15k miles out of my rears and 30k out of fronts with those settings.

as far as the difference between the 2 cars, i doubt the type of wheels have that much of an effect. as long as your overall tire sizes are pretty much the same then it wont differ that much. its probably more the variation in camber from the factory among these cars. some people can stay closer to spec with the same drop. you see the same sort of variation in dyno #s from the factory.

 

Looked like a good install day. Sorry I wasn't able to go due to work and a morning appt with a customer (ended up being a car deal so it all worked out in my favor).

Max, you're gonna enjoy the extra hp from the Motordyne plenum spacer. I remember it took me 2 hours to do the spacer install since I took my time with the instructions and torque specs. If you have a few other performance mods in the G, I would advise getting your car re-tuned so that you'll have a more accurate benchmark of the car's performance.

Let me know when there's an install meet coming up next time, and I'll try my best to be there.

 

install was awesome! wish i could have stayed longer but looks like it was a blast, we will have to do it again soon, now i just need more parts to install :-P