ont wheels misaligned

[mpaton]

Having had my Mirage since new in March of this year, I became aware of the rear toe issue early on, and paid for an alignment check of the rear toe early on. this showed that it was probably out of spec, but not by much, so I decided to await further developments.

Now, it's just back from its first dealer service, and I asked for and got a free alignment check. Unsurprisingly, the rear toe was indeed just out on the right, at 0.04 degrees on the left and 0.33 degrees on the right, making a total toe of 0.37 degrees which is within spec.

No abnormal tire wear noted yet, at 8000 miles.

However, a few days later, i looked at the readout again, and was amazed to see the front camber measurements, of

-3.7 degrees left front and +3.5 degrees right front.

I'd not seen any figures like that on this forum, so now I'm wondering if they just didn't bother to set up the machine properly, as I told them rear toe was the interesting measurement.

The service manager was reluctant to do anything about it, despite knowing that almost of the Mirages he sees have tires worn out at 20,000 miles, and he didn't think that a new strut from Mitsubishi would change anything. I think I'm going to have words with an old friend elsewhere in the hierarchy of the dealership family.

[3dplane]

You must be talking about caster where a + 3.5 would be about the middle of specs. ( not negative though).

If camber was at -3.7° the top of the wheel would be caved in and + 3.5° the top of the wheel would be sticking out from the fender.

[mpaton]

You must be talking about caster where a + 3.5 would be about the middle of specs. ( not negative though).

If camber was at -3.7° the top of the wheel would be caved in and + 3.5° the top of the wheel would be sticking out from the fender.

I understand why you'd say that, but no, that's what the sheet says.

Caster sort of matches the camber strangeness, at 4.6 degrees left and 3.4 degrees right.

I've crudely aligned cars by eye before, and I'd expect to spot it if the camber were out by that much.

I didn't think it was possible to misapply the wheel units on an alignment machine that much, but I have seen both ignorance and stupidity before.
I should have watched it being done.

I've got one of the SMART camber gauges myself, with the Smart Level in a fixture you hold up to the wheel, so now I'll have to go and try it. It won't be as accurate as a Hunter, but it will be better than a misused Hunter.

I'm also pretty sure I could tell from driving if the front camber was really set like this. The difference in cornering power left to right would be noticeable.

Thanks for the confirmation that these readings make no sense.

Michael