The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Driveline camber angle

I am having the front straight axle on my 53 1/2 ton pickup altered along with a 57 Bel Air 2" drop spindle so I can put 12.88 Wilwood 6 piston disk brakes on it. I will be running an 8" wide tall tire. I have done some searching on desired camber angle. Some say positive some say negative. This is a driver with a nasty side. I may wander into a drag strip now and then and hope to run drag week this year. I'm running a blown 292 that I believe is lighter than the 235 even with the 4-71 blower. When they do the work I would like to give them an angle. Thank you for you time and any advice.

Each truck will be different, really depends on the stance, how high the rear is compared to the front. I would start at 4, most of the hotrods on the HAMB board are in the 7 range, all positive. Any good alignment shop with older guys running it, would know how to set it up.
Hope you have power steering with those 8" wide tires!

Joe. Mick is referring to Camber in the text.
I like a small amount of neg. camber. It may wear the tires a little more on the inside but is not hardly any difference with radial tires. About 1/8 " neg Camber. It seems to handle better that way. The Caster would be like Joe says. A very small amount of toe-in with radial tires if every thing is in top notch shape in the front end. 1/16 ".
George

Camber, Joe- - - -not caster! He's destroyed all the geometry that was built into the axle with the drop and the spindle change, so anything we suggest will be a SWAG at best. Nothing like going into uncharted territory without a map, or even a clue about what the final geometry needs be. I'm sure he can find somebody to tell him a fanciful lie about what's right, but it won't be anyone with any real understanding of steering angles.
Jerry

Thank you for your reply. I will be running EPAS electric power steering. This axle has not been made yet. I'm just looking for an angle to give my builder. The truck will be level with 4" drop total.

Thanks for that Jerry. I'm not building this myself I'm just trying to get information on the subject. If they need to CNC the whole thing out so be it. If nobody went into uncharted territory without a map we would all be living across the pond. If it doesn't work they can change it, it's just steel. I have a large group of engineers that work for me and access to a $50 million dollar orthopedic machine shop. My friend would make it out of Titanium if I ask him to. Thank you for your thoughts.

I'd suggest going with a camber angle that will put as much of that wide tire footprint as possible on the ground. That would probably be zero, or maybe 1/2 degree negative. Using the conventional 2-3 degree positive camber angle used with tall, skinny tires with a straight axle will result in the tires wearing the outside of the tread quickly, and losing whatever imaginary advantage a wide tire offers. They're going to hydroplane at any speed above a crawl anytime there's even a moderate amount of rainfall. I'd also suggest driving it only on dry, sunny days.

Thank you Jerry. sounds like a thinner tire may be in order. I live in the midwest so rain is possible at any moment.

I missed the caster, camber angle there, so about that. I would still head over to the HAMB and search around, they build way more hotrods then on this site. I would also think anybody in the drop axle business should know how to keep the camber where it should be, if not I would look for a different shop.