Asymmetric front camber, '23 w/coilovers
 

Just had coilovers installed on the new '23, yay! Except...

They could only get -2.1 degrees camber at the front left. They set the front right to the same camber, and on that side the adjuster is actually on the positive-camber side of the range! If I set both fronts to max negative camber, I'd have -2.1 LF and probably -4.5 to -5 RF.

Shop that installed work almost entirely on track cars, know their stuff. I would suspect their alignment machine but when I picked up the car they were just confirming with a camber gauge off the machine, in fact I heard it confirmed before they even knew I was right there.

It seems to me that the front subframe must be offset to the right a LOT relative to the unibody. What do y'all think?

Situation is kind of intolerable as I compete in time trials and tenths *matter*! For this weekend at Palmer CCW I'll crank in some front right camber but ultimately I'll need *at least* -3 front camber, -2.1 is not going to cut it.

Also if anyone could tell me why my pics are coming in sideways and how to fix that, lemme know!

The lower mount is slotted for camber adjustment...I'm guessing that the front lower mount on the left side is not maxed out, or is even maxed out in the wrong direction.

It should be pretty clear visually...compare the lower mount on one side to the other. PM me more pics if you like.

- Andrew

This was my first suspicion, but I raised the front and confirmed that it we are indeed maxed out at the lower mount...

Ordered SPC bolts, see what that gets me I guess. Dammitall...

Car is at Patriot Subaru for oil pan/pickup tube RTV inspection, asked them to have a look and see if they can get me some desperately needed front left cambers...

I ended up ordering SPC bolts as well when placing my coilover order with Shaftworks. Jon was telling me it's not uncommon for there to be an offset left to right in the camber plates. This is due to the subframe as you pointed out

May as well get ahold of the smaller 12mm bolts for the top, as well.
PNs for nut and bolt, need 2x of each
90105 - 14147
90080 - 17208

You can probably also just swap the camber plate hats side to side for more caster since you'll likely hit your camber target with the camber plate nearly at its 0 position unless you're going for like -5.5. You can just unbolt the 4 pinch bolts from each camber plate to swap them.

(what i've said here is specific to the shaftworks stuff, not related to the top post)

I've never ever seen a difference left to right that much from the factory BUT I do get phone calls not infrequently from people and shops that forget to push the hubs in when tightening the 2 bolts for the lower mount to get as much camber as possible down there. Just sayin! We're adding a lot more detail in the instructions and making a video of this soon (Monday).

EDIT: not saying it's impossible that there's something up with the front subframe or some sort of other issue...but that would be a big deal. Did it look off before?

EDIT2: also remember the bolt on the right side goes in the opposite direction as it does on the left.

- Andrew

Yup, I'm *sure* that most shops will miss this, but not Wile Motorsports. Proprietor was into motorsports before he started the biz, and they pretty much only work on race cars. *Still* I lifted the front of the car when I got it home and loosened the bolts to double-check for myself, and indeed they had them tightened at max negative camber adjustability with the slots/holes.

When I went to pick up the car I observed proprietor manually double-checking the alignment measurements from the machine, same camber numbers within a tenth or two.

Still I will have Patriot Subaru look at camber again to triple-check and also to see if they have any ideers. Might ask if they can shift the front subframe to the left. And maybe the rear subframe to the right!

If i can't get to *at least* -3 at the front left, will resort to SPC camber bolts and maybe source a couple of grade 12.9 M12 bolts/nuts for the uppers, torqued to 110 lb-ft.

By my calcs, and assuming the measurements in post #1 are correct, then if the front right is adjusted to max negative camber up top, it'd be at around -2.1FL/-4.4FR. That's a built-in difference of 2.3 degrees. Not sure what the factory spec is but it might be impossible to get both fronts into spec camber range with the stock suspension. LAME!

All that said, there *does* seem to be inherently limited camber adjustment with the RCE SS-2 upper mount arrangement. If I was able to shift the subframe, it looks like the most front camber I could get at both sides would be (-2.1 - 4.4)/2 = -3.25 with subframe perfectly centered relative to strut mounts.

Didn't really scrutinize front camber symmetry with the stock suspension. Basically both sides looked like zero camber plus/minus...

I'm gonna need clarification on this, don't see what possible difference that could make! FWIW both left and right have the nuts at the front of the strut. I think...

Eagle eye Larry in the office has looked at the pics and has confirmed the strut bolt is installed incorrectly on that side, which is why the hub can't push in as far.

The nuts should on the right side of the car should be towards the back of the car. That's the problem.

The instructions say they bolts can only go in one way...but...apparently it's possible to get them in the other way. We are adding more detail.

- Amdrew

The right side is *no problem*!
It's the left side that's limited to -2.1 degrees. See pics of left-side strut bolts/nuts and left- and right-side camber plate positions. Left is maxed out, but only -2.1 degrees :cry:

Is it just me or does the hub looks to be cambered out? The two red lines are supposed to the converge to the top and they look like they converge to the bottom. I would expect the hub to be more inline with the blue line.
Maybe it's just the aluminum hub having an angled machined area though...

Dude, c’mon…. Look at the top bolt location relative to edge of RCE clevis, V’s bottom bolt. It’s maxed out for negative camber which I confirmed already a few times. Same procedure both sides, yet left side is at -2.1 full adjustment at top mount, right side set to match left side is not even on the negative adjustment side at top. Car is WAY asymmetrical. Or both alignment machine and manual camber gauge are off by same amount. Which will be checked…

Having never seen the strut holes on the coils I'll defer to your judgment.

If the car was "WAY asymmetrical" it would have had a 2 degree difference in stock form which would be very noticeable. As you said the stock car looked about zero camber (as it should) and there is little to no stock camber adjustment I don't see why aftermarket parts would suddenly expose a severe asymmetry in the car.

I would suggest swapping back to the stock strut assembly and stock bolts (i.e. nothing is adjustable) and checking camber (even visually) to prove/disprove subframe issues.

I was wondering about this just having installed tarmac 0s on my ‘23 over the weekend. I was pretty sure that on the right side the stock configuration had the nuts on the side of the strut facing the front of the car. But when I installed the tarmacs with the stock 16mm top strut/knuckle bolt it would only go in the other direction.

I ended up buying a set of the stock 14mm crash bolts to install on the top and flipped it around to the stock orientation. Is this okay?

You might as well! This isn't my first rodeo with camber. I've loosened every suspension bolt on one corner of my 240Z and had the shop guy assist me as we cranked in as much negative camber as we could while retightening bolts!

I can assure you I would not have noticed the difference if stock one side had been -1 and the other side +1. I never scritinized and to me both sides just look like "not *nearly* enough camber" as I'm used to -3.5.

They suddenly expose severe asymmetry because this is the first time camber on this car has been scrutinized. However it is possible the RCE parts are where the asymmetry is coming in, or that factory and RCE parts are both "off" in the same direction compounding the error.

Meh, not likely to happen, going to have alignment triple-checked at Subaru Dealer where car is now, see what they get, then go from there. If those agree with the race shop's numbers, I'll install SPC camber bolts in the lower holes and possibly grade 12.9 M12 bolts/screws at the upper holes, which should get me to at least -3 which would be (somewhat) acceptable.

All very confusing. Do you have a pic of the lower mount on the side with not enough camber?

Monday...I'm making a video.

- Andrew

Just for reference, had the same issue with mine. About 1.7 more camber on right vs left after coilover install when both set to max camber.

Data point, for my kw variants, driver side I had to use bottom oem bolt on top slot and camber bolt on bottom to get -4.6 ish. I was at -3.5 ish if I just used bottom bolt on top. So not as bad as you.

On passenger side, I got -4.5 with just the bottom bolt on top. With slotted hole and camber plates maxed out on both sides.

Jrz had the same issues on the same car.

That's wild. I've not seen front alignment differences due to the factory subframe that large but it appears that it's possible and happens to decent number of people. @ZDan ...keep me posted!

- Andrew

Piccie of left front strut

Have you tried loosening that lower bolt and pulling the knuckle out more?

I loosened both bolts and ensured the the top bolt was as far in as possible, and the top bolt as far out as possible.

Don't know how many more times I'll have to say it, but camber is MAXED at those bolts.

Oops should have read more carefully. I’d try putting the oem Subaru crash bolts in the upper slot which I believe was mentioned. I thought the lower mounting was point was slotted but it’s the upper that’s slotted.

I did replace upper bolts with OEM subaru "crash bolts" (which are same as 14mm lower bolts).

Just received SPC camber bolts to install in place of lower bolts. If I'da known I'd have to resort to this I could've saved ~$15 I spent on the Subaru crash bolts!

So how much will SPC camber bolts by themselves get me in terms of negative camber? Hopefully a degree anyway...

I was able to get -1.2° or so with the SPC lower.
Plus -1° when I added upper crash bolt.


Interestingly when I did Bilsteins they had issues getting camber set intially. Had to fully loosen everything on the rack then jam on the strut and adjust it for everything to shift properly.

Best case scenario something weird like that is happening but who knows.

'23 BRZ, stock suspension + verus camber plates in the front:

Left side plate is maxed out, right side has a visible gap:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/eneyjrowsp...5645.jpg?raw=1

Alignment specs (car is a '23, I guess they don't have the new specs in their system yet):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/betdgveivr...5407.jpg?raw=1

Did the knowledgeable track race shop use a screw driver to move the camber plate on the right side? It looks gouged.

The angles of the strut mount and the knuckle look different to on the right and left side. The nut / bolt positions on the strut mount look different. Counting the machining row marks on the hub one side looks even and other has more row exposed at the top. What do I know.:iono:.

Added my photos of stock shocks and OEM subaru camber bolts on the right side of the car for reference. I didn't put it on an alignment rack. I do my own alignments and only measured .2 or .3 degree difference between the sides.

If the subframe was offset, wouldn't that show up in the thrust angle measurement?

AFAIK could have been delivered that way, could be shipping/handling before or after I unpacked and repacked the boxes, Functionality not affected, not worried about it.

Not much. Counting machining marks means absolutely nothing. Both sides are maxed for negative camber. Feel free to swing by and check for yourself after I get the car back. What part of NY are ya in, it's a big state...

Happy for you. My '17 was similar.

Alignment will be measured again before further measures are taken. Current evidence suggests my car's camber is quite asymmetrical at both ends of the car, particularly at the front, but we'll see...

If the *front* subframe was off, no, that would not show up in thrust angle measurement... In any case I don't have "before" measurements, what you see in the first post are measurements after adjusting.

If it helps you, my KW clubsport (structurally are the same as yours) give me -3.1 ° of camber maximum.

It is a GT86 2014, but the values should be similar, I would say you have the subframe displaced to lose that -1 °

I had maybe a 0.5 deg difference left to right for maximum camber on my SS1s. I just ended up removing that side and elongating the slot a little. IDK what the root cause was (subframe or SS1 asymmetry).

You could pull the bolts that are through the SS2 slots and put a caliper on them to verify they are the same length. You might also verify that both bolts fully seat into the semi-circle of the slot vs. being just a touch out of position and getting hung up at the start of the curvature.

I had my suspension installed last year by Elite Performance who had their own Shop Gen1 FRS and have worked on countless Gen1 and now Gen2 twins. I have a camber bolt at the lower position on the struts and I too have an imbalance. It's something they noted to me after the install. The result of needing to max out the camber plate is having endlink contact with the body on the driver side. Passenger side is still clear and might still clear maxed out (which is odd).

Unlike others, some combination of my car, my shop, my parts has managed to get more camber - which I am grateful for but thought I'd add some more info in case it becomes useful.

https://i.imgur.com/Cbo8FQy.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/SaaZubE.jpg

This is the witness marks on the body of the car from the driver-side endlink just from street driving.
I've yet to drive this updated maxed out camber setting on track yet. If anyone has any warnings/war stories, please tell me soon!
https://i.imgur.com/lfeo5El.jpg

Driver side:
https://i.imgur.com/l3KQKrn.jpg

Passenger side:
https://i.imgur.com/JAzB2Jx.jpg

Is Melody still working there and doing alignments?

You bet and she pretty much does all of my alignments.

Nice, she's great at them isn't she? Thanks for letting me know.

Any updates Dan on this situation?