Hi guys,
As some of you may noe, I'm fairly new to this forum, but I've been reading quite a bit and finding this forum very useful and informative, filled with nice people.

The question I have is that I've heard when you put a set of lowering springs on a car (that's basically the only thing you need to lower the height of a car right?), g35 for eg, the wheels will tilt inwards and create an awkward look, and also illegal in Canada.

Can someone please clarify this? Right or wrong idea? How can one fix this?

thx a lot

 

It's called camber when the wheels tilt inward or outward...you will need a camber kit to fix that. Search around this forum to find detailed info.

 

here forget the search it will take forever. It doesnt do me any good.

As of right now i know there are 3 companies that make camber kits.

1. Stillen (way to expensive)
2. Kinetix Racing (very reasonably priced)
3. SPC (dont know anything about them)

take a look into all of them

This is the only way to fix the camber.

 

To explain what happens, lowering a car essentially compresses the suspension. Any suspension arm moves on an axis. The suspension travels on an arc. Double-wishbone and multilink suspensions do so using at least an upper and lower arm of unequal lengths. The upper one is shorter and travels on a shorter arc. Because of this for a given amount of vertical suspension travel, the upper one will pull in towards the center of the car faster than the lower arm. The end result is the top of the tire will tilt inward as the suspension compresses. Consequently, lowering also causes this effect. This is actually a good thing as it helps to maintain a flatter contact patch as the car leans during a turn. And actually having a bit more static camber over OEM helps to make a car handle better. But tire wear on the inside edge tends to increase and braking and acceleration traction tend to decrease slightly. But generally, unless you lower the car a lot, you probably won't notice the change visually. Lowering to the point where it starts to look funny or at least very noticably, would probably introduce a whole set of other problems from bottoming out, the suspension and the car, to having some funky suspension geometry.

 

thanks for the advices and exlaination guys. But if someone could give me a picture or a visual on how this all happens it would be much appreciated.

 

now im going to say do a search. Do a search using my name and i remember posting about this. Just look thru all the threads I HAVE STARTED.

good luck

 

After you lower your G, you should have an alignment done. Some say wait a few hundred miles to let the springs "settle". Once you get the alignment this will give you a better idea on the amount of negative camber you may have. To correct the negative camber (in the front) you will need a-arms.

Here are the ones that are available:

$849.00 Stillen front upper control arms
http://www.stillen.com/Sportscars_de...d=43318&page=1

$849.95 350EVO front upper control arms
http://www.350evo.com/catalog/produc...products_id/73

$389.00 Cusco front upper control arms
http://z1auto.com/prodmore.asp?model...ng&prodid=1288

$369.99 Kinetix front upper control arms
http://www.kinetixracing.com/index.a...WPROD&ProdID=7

Performance Nissan used to make a set for $800 but I believe they discontinued them because they are now selling the Stillen a-arms.

 

Thanks a lot guys for the reply, I really appreciated it. However, I got a new question, although related to my old topic.

If I install a coilover on a g35, such as this:
http://www.grubbsperformance.com/Mer...5CoupeCoilover

will I still have camber problems? It mentions it has camber adjustments on some incidents, what does that include?

If a coilover does lowers a car, provides adjustable suspension, camber adjustments, isn't it much better than a spring + control-arm combo? In addition, if one goes for the spring+control-arm combo, doesn't he/she needs 2 sets of control-arm to fix the front AND the rear camber problems? Or does the rear doesn't matter as much?

thx in advance

 

The Hipermax RS is a great set of coilovers...
On certain applications camber can be adjusted on the uper pillowball mounts.
Unfortunately, the G35 is NOT one of those applications. I don't know the technical reason for this, but I don't believe the G35 uses the pillowball mounts.

Here's what I can tell you from my experience. I have an '03 sedan which I lowered with HKS Hipermax LS coilovers. After I had an alignment done it showed that I had a small amount of negative camber in the front (the rear was within specifications). Since good tires cost a fortune and I was concerned about uneven tire wear I ordered the Kinetix A-arms. I found them to be a little lacking in the build quality area so I ended up selling them before I had them installed. Now I've ordered the Cusco set but they are back ordered so I'm still waiting. I hope this helps.

 

Aww... that's a disappointing fact...
So if we lower a G all around, do we need rear upper control arms to adjust the camber at the rear wheels?

Skeleton, what you say your rear was within spec, does it still have a negative camber? What is within spec? It is just a standard but it will still create uneven tire wear right?

 

First before you lower your car you should probably have a basic understanding of alignment.

READ THIS

And to answer your question, it really depends on how much you lower the car that will determine if you need a camber and/or toe correction kit. From the factory, our cars does not have any camber adjustment up front and have limited adjustment in the rear. There are aftermarket upper control arms that have been listed here in this thread that go on the front of the car to correct camber. For the rear there are also adjustable camber/toe arms. Before you can decide if you need a camber kit, you need to decide what lowering springs your are going to choose.

 

Here are my specs:

FRONT CAMBER SPECIFIED RANGE: -1.3 to 0.3 degrees
ACTUAL: Left -1.4 degrees Right -1.8 degrees

REAR CAMBER SPECIFIED RANGE: -2.0 to -1.0 degrees
ACTUAL: Left -1.4 degrees Right -1.4 degrees

 

dklau, thanks for the link, that was very informative.
Now I know that a factory g35 has limited adjustment in the rear, and I'm guessing that's why most ppl will only need a front camber adjustment kit, if they need one.

Thanks for providing the information skeleton, may I ask how bad is, for example, a 1 degree negative tilt?

 

One degree outside of spec or just one degree?

 

Camber plates will not work on our cars. They only work on strut-based suspensions.

We essentially have a double-wishbone suspension which consists of an upper and lower arm. The upper arm is shorter which causes the top of the steering knuckle to follow a shorter radius of movement. The lower arm is longer and follows a larger radius of movement. When the suspension is compressed, since the suspension arm will be moving towards the center of the car faster than the lower arm for the same amount of vertical movement. This is what is causing the camber to change when you lower the car. This is one of the better suspension designs as it adds negative camber which helps you to have a better dynamic camber angle while in a turn. It allows you to keep a relatively low static camber angle which helps to keep the contact patch more optimal for braking and acceleration as well. Tire wear is also better.

The type of suspension that allows you to change camber with camber plates uses a strut type suspension. It only uses one suspension arm. The lower one. The top of the suspension is not located by another arm, but by the shock itself. A strut is basically a shock that is desgined as a locating part of the suspension and affects the steering geometry. Easy way to picture this is to understand that if you remove a shock the suspension will still be in tact and follow the same suspension travel. If you remove a strut, the wheel will literally hang by the lower control arm. That being said where the top of the strut is located affects the angle and suspension geometry. A camber plate is designed to replace the upper strut bearing and allow you to move the centerline of the strut, in or out away fdrom the centerline of the car. Doing so pushes the top of the wheel in or out. And before you start complaining that we do not have this kind of ease, know this. A strut design experiances very little dynamic camber change under compression. The result is that you end up riding heavily on the outer shoulder of the tire under hard turns. To effectively combat this without changing the alignment, you have to pretty much eliminate body roll. My 240sx had a MacPherson Strut design and even with aftermarket sway bars exhibited plenty of roll. I used to kill the outer tread of my tires at the track. I had to dial in about 2 extra degrees of negative camber to keep the tires happy. But having more static camber affected braking slightly. Our G's have a much easier time dealing with this as it does not need to compromise so much.

I have thought about the possibility of using an eccentric bolt/bushings on the chassis side of the suspension arms as a cost effective measure. I have to take a closer look at the suspension to see if this might actually be feasable though. For an example of what I am talking about scroll down about 3/4ths of the way on this page:

http://www.pdm-racing.com/products/suspension.html