fix camber issues with lowered IRS

I am lowering an IRS beetle chassis for my speedster widebody, i dont know the year of the chassis but the number on the frame tunnel is 1162097049, when i dropped the rear the wheels went way out of camber(plumb?) , my kit car dude said to cut and spread the top of the trailing arm, I really didn't like that idea and was told to swap thr arms left to right, flip em and remount the shock mounts. Any thoughts?

We can build our rear trailing arms to a zero camber at any ride hight. They also have camber and toe adjustments for tuning.....

William- per the chassis-dating archive on "the Samba" your type I is around/within this s/n range: 116 2 097 865 - Feb,1976 (type I)

How much did you lower it? - i'd think less than 2" would be ok. Are you using low profile tires - whould would mean you could lower it less with the torsion bars.

William,

I lowered my IRS about 1-1/2". Got the car aligned yesterday, I am within 1.5 - 2 degrees negative camber. Perfectly acceptable. I actually wanted to be at 1.5d negative. Positive camber causes the problems. If your wheels are in closer to the body at the top than the bottom I wouldnt think it to critical an issue. I hate to think of cutting and re-welding any suspension components (I do have an adjustable front beam).

Paul

Paul - Where does noticeable inner tire wear start to occur though. Guess no one is putting 20k miles on a Speedie per year - but a soft compond tire could possibly disappear fast.

Ultimate fix of raising the engine up just creates too much work for a pan based chassis.

Wolfgang,

I have noticeable tire wear all over, front and back, side to side. Between replacing a spindle roadside and lowering the rear I Def. needed the 4 wheel alignment. I think I need to replace the left spindle now, could not get it within spec on the machine. THats the new spindle... Ill let you know how the tires wear at the end of this summer. I hope to put 20K on this car this year!

Paul

Paul,

Depending on how much you need to get the front within spec, you can always try "super eccentric". They are designed for the lower front ends and give 3 degrees of adjustment instead of 2.

CIP has them http://www2.cip1.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=C12-6612-10

or I can bring a pair to Carlisle as long as I knew by about 10am tomorrow.

Paul - HA, I have nine (or ten) 20 year old Michelin XZX tires for mine (5 on Pedrini's and 4 on 2L Fuchs alloy rims). I know they aren't safe for high speed use or wet roads - but they have to be so hard that they will never wear! I don't see any cracks - as they have been in garage covered with canvas wheel covers. Gues once I have alignment squared away - I'll replace.