Hi Fred, not on my 164

["C.M. Smith" <cmsmith@domain.elided>]

Woah Fred

Did I hear the sound of a casually tossed gauntlet?

Maybe I should've said MY 164 eats tires, except I've expressed this view
before and no takers. Also, my dealer has assured me that they had several
complaints along these lines.

Jus' the fax ma'am:

 Front camber readings :  Left front 1.69 to 2.0 degrees negative,Right
front 2.44to 2.51 degrees negative

Rear camber readings: Left rear 0.16 to 0.79degrees negative,  Right rear
0.52 to 1.55 degrees negative.

The revised factory spec for 91's is:  front 1.1 to 2.4 degrees negative
(wow quite a range of acceptable values), and  rear 0.1 degrees positive to
1.8 degrees negative (ditto wow).

Factory toe should be front 0 to negative 2mm and rear positive 4 to 6 mm.
I believe it is and always has been set correctly on my car. (I do know my
car quite well, 112,000 original Kilometers from new).

It is very unusual for a front drive car to have STATIC toe in (i e
positive toe) at the front because the drive draws the wheels forward,
toeing them IN under dynamic loading. A rear drive car will tend to toe out
under dynamic loading so static toe is positive (toe in). 

I agree that the objective is to get as close to zero toe as possible,
without getting toe out. BUT, this is zero toe under dynamic loading, not
static toe. As the suspension wears, more static toe is required to
achieve zero dynamic toe. For front drivers generally this means setting
static toe for toe out, up to the maximum factory spec,if necessary. For
rear drivers this generally means setting more toe in, to the maximum toe
in permitted (although some steering layouts on rear drive cars are the
reverse of this I believe,  it depends where the effective centers of the
tie rods are).

If you're racing you can afford to set the static toe very carefully to
achieve dynamic zero toe for top speed, or toe in for less understeer and a
little enhanced feel. I believe some racers prefer dynamic toe out but
that's beyond me I'm afraid. For street use, zero toe or a little toe in is
generally accepted to be desirable. I prefer as close to zero dynamic toe
as possible but I refuse to accept toe out as the car gets too darty on the
street. Steering feel is mainly a function of the "trail" which is more
affected by caster and tire profile than toe settings.

As for tire eating 164s , trust me, my 164 eats front tires for breakfast,
and it's due to the large negative camber on my car (just barely at the
maximum permitted, allowing charitably for errors in the alignment machines
and operators). How bad is it? How about a set of summers (factory Goodyear
NCTs) and a set of winters (Michelin 300 SX) in 95,000 kilometers, that's
two sets of tires in under 60,000 miles, and in fact the winters were shot
after only 73,000 km so nearly two sets were gone in under 45,000 miles.
These are not high performance tires, regular V and H rated 195/65 x 15s.
Do I drive hard and fast? Yes. Is this the reason for the tire wear? Is
this acceptable tire wear? No. How do I know? 

My 86 SAAB 9000 Turbo ran for 142,000 kilometers on a set of 195/60x 15
Pirelli P6 V rated and a set of 185/65 x 15 Gislaved Winters (T rated), and
the Gislaveds lasted another 15,000 km before I got tired of waiting for
them to wear out and switched to a set of Michelin Alpins. The SAAB has
been driven at least as hard and fast as the ALFA, if not harder and
faster. Plus, NO alignments were required on the SAAB, the factory settings
were preserved until the struts were replaced. The ALFA has had four
alignments in the same or less mileage.


The SAAB's tires lasted more than 50% longer. The SAAB is almost exactly
comparable to the ALFA, except for 300lbs extra weight on the ALFA and a
fully independent strut suspension all round on the ALFA. The SAAB uses
strut front and a beam axle ( as for the Milano, but using a low center
panhard rod instead of the superior Watt's linkage found on the Milano).
The difference? The ALFA specs up to 2.4 degrees negative camber for the
front wheels, (and delivered my car with the max!).

As for toe in cutting into top speed I confess I've not quite topped out
the ALFA, but around 230 km/hr seems reasonable given the 4,000 foot plus
elevation I drive at, I doubt very much that the toe setting makes as much
difference as the thin air. I don't know about your area but around here
the Mounties get pretty excited when you try to outrun their Caprices or
Crown Vics. I regularly drive up to 180 km/hr when conditions seem to be
safe enough for that and the fancy strikes me. Most of my highway driving
is done in the 140-170 km/hr band. Excessive toe in would not seriously
affect these speeds, but it might even out the tire wear by wearing the
outside ribs fast too!!!

Of course you could be joshing me, in which case you know all this already
and apologies in advance for boring you!

Cheers


At 12:20 PM 9/21/99 +0300, you wrote:
>Michael Smith is telling us what little he knows about his 164.  Untrue
>about eating tires even after alignment.   When 164 wheels are aligned
>straight ahead, no toe, tires will last many thousands of miles and wear
>evenly.  I never rotate my wheels and one would never guess the mileage.
>
>When you think about it, any amount of toe in or out creates drag
>particularly on the edges.  Inside edge too much toe-out and outside
>edge means too much toe-in.  What else does anything but no-toe do?
>Less gas mileage, of course and reduced top speed.  Might as well throw
>out an anchor.  Fred Di Matteo

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