Winter (Alignment) is Coming

[Hostile_Kittens]

Sorry about the cutesy title, I couldn't help myself.

So I'm looking to swap my winter wheels, stock struts, and 1" lift spacers on for the winter season and have been wondering about what numbers to run for a street alignment.

I'm doing an alignment regardless since I'm pulling my coils off.

My aggressive summer setup is -3.0F/-2.2R, I was thinking 0F/0R or even +0.5F/0R, any input on caster or toe either?

Does anyone have any input on what give the most stability on packed snow, ice, and cold pavement?

[Ernest72]

Obviously changing for clearance will help, but the alignment will not really make a difference unless you were running extreme camber. Never changed my alignment when I switch to winters on my WRX.

[churchx]

Hmm, interesting question. Most alignment numbers i've seen, was for daily driving on tarmac (at most wet) or for track. Haven't seen mentioned, what works best when there is little grip, like on gravel roads/ice/snow, for rally-ish driving. I also guess that moderate camber within -1.5 to -3 shouldn't hurt anything (but imho won't net anything either, as car will be drifting long before higher negative camber will add extra grip) and don't intend to deal it back .. but it would be interesting to find out, what theoretically works best on gripless pavement.

[JazzleSAURUS]

Don't go positive.

Go -1.0 or so and you'll be happy. A slight lift is fun.

I'm doing 3/8" spacers and a 215/60R16 this year. Last year I did just stock suspension with a 215/65, so I'm hoping for slightly less slop.

[venturaII]

What's wrong with stock if you're swapping back to other stock components? What's your winter wheel setup?

[Amillionoh7]

Just a little insight. I do alignments for my job at a dealership and -3 deg camber is WAY to much for a daily. For low traction you want to keep the tire as flat as possible 0 deg camber and 0 toe, but when the wheel travels up and down those settings change so we add some negative camber to help compensate when the suspension is compressed but also being a McPherson strut it has issues with keeping camber in a hard turn so some negative camber is there just to keep the camber from going positive on sharp turns. Long story short. The factory alignment specs will provide you the best setup even for winter. maybe a little more caster if you really want to. if you have any questions pm me

[go_a_way1]

I just keep my coils on I am only a little lower. Slap the stock wheels on and I am good to go. Roughly -2.5 camber front and -2 rear so it's not that much

[churchx]

Factory alignment specs of 0 all around should be changed to at least by adding more camber in front only, to dial out some 'factory' understeer bias with nothing else touched in suspension. Some slight toe-in in rear imho also is worth doing over factory alignment, even more so in winter, to get slight self-stabilising under throttle.

[wparsons]

Originally Posted by Amillionoh7

Just a little insight. I do alignments for my job at a dealership and -3 deg camber is WAY to much for a daily. For low traction you want to keep the tire as flat as possible 0 deg camber and 0 toe, but when the wheel travels up and down those settings change so we add some negative camber to help compensate when the suspension is compressed but also being a McPherson strut it has issues with keeping camber in a hard turn so some negative camber is there just to keep the camber from going positive on sharp turns. Long story short. The factory alignment specs will provide you the best setup even for winter. maybe a little more caster if you really want to. if you have any questions pm me

To add to that, camber is needed to keep the tire flat as suspension compresses and body roll comes into play. In the winter, you're probably not loading up the suspension anywhere near as much, which means the tire is pretty flat with 0 camber.

I'd probably go with -1 F and -0.5 R to keep it reasonable on dry pavement too.

I drive with ~-2.5 all around all year, and it's definitely not ideal for timid drivers with that much rear camber on slick surfaces.

[Amillionoh7]

Originally Posted by wparsons

To add to that, camber is needed to keep the tire flat as suspension compresses and body roll comes into play. In the winter, you're probably not loading up the suspension anywhere near as much, which means the tire is pretty flat with 0 camber.

I'd probably go with -1 F and -0.5 R to keep it reasonable on dry pavement too.

I drive with ~-2.5 all around all year, and it's definitely not ideal for timid drivers with that much rear camber on slick surfaces.

pretty much exactly what I was trying to say. thank you

[venturaII]

I guess I wasn't wordy enough. lol We also still don't know what he's running for a winter wheel/tire combo either, which will influence alignment setup.

[churchx]

From what i see from comments of others: up to -2.5 front / upto -2 rear might not be ideal due not reaching side loads becoming large enough for even such mild camber increase to be best one, but as it's interim/reasonable little enough over stock, for majority to not bother enough to dial that back during winter due inconvenience of extra two re-alignments needed during season changes & little difference to be had from that "ideal", when camber is only at this level. I'm also another one not bothering, but asked just for interest sake, to widen knowledge about car / suspension.
P.S.
There is one exception to this though. That is - ice racing on "saws", how here in jargon those skinny ice-racing studded tires with enormously big studs are called. Often seen, that if track has record laptimes for it, then winter records on ice with "saws" usually are better then best summer lap times with normal rubber on dry tarmac. So probably loads on tires/suspension can be high enough for camber to matter again, or it works different way with those 15x5.5 high sidewall tires with 2-3cm studs?

[venturaII]

Originally Posted by churchx

So probably loads on tires/suspension can be high enough for camber to matter again, or it works different way with those 15x5.5 high sidewall tires with 2-3cm studs?

Skinny tires with tall sidewalls are much less sensitive to camber than low profile, wide tires. If the stock struts are re-used, I'd keep it simple and just go for factory toe settings, and when swapping the struts, just keep pressure on the strut from the outside while snugging up the knuckle bolts to get any 'free' camber. Done. Go drive it. They're squirmy snow tires - they won't be generating big g loads in the first place.

[churchx]

They won't? Google for images of ice rally tires. They grip immensly, hacking those monster studs in ice hence imho loads on tire should be as big if not higher (due very high profile and thus very big sidewall flex? Though then again they maybe overpump it to donut spacesaver pressures). I'm not sure i'll ever join awd subbies on iced lakes due low clearance of toyobaru and high possibility to break front bumper if sliding out of track and digging in deep piles of snow, but it probably is lot of fun.