Camber Adjustment - car pulling to left

[andreasaravis]

Hi all,

I’ve got a 2009 3 door Ibiza 6j.

I took the car to get the wheel alignment done as it was pulling to the left, and although the garage managed to get the toe straitened up the camber on the left passenger side is out by a nearly two degrees.

He said that the camber cannot he adjusted on the front so he said the subframe may have moved which maybe causing it to be out so he went away and after an hour the camber was still the same.

He theory is the car may have hit a kerb that side or pot hole quite badly causing it to be out so he suggested changing the lower control arms on both sides and the suspension legs, as if these has a kink in it would cause the camber to be out.

I’ve had the lower control arms changed and the car is still pulling to the left. Do I spend more money changing the suspension legs? For it to still pull to the left? Can the camber be adjusted up front?!?! Without having to do all this work?

I’m at a crossroads.

The car has never been in an accident by the way.

 

[RUM4MO]

No the camber can not be altered, but will change if you fit shorter or sports springs - also one side should increase in camber and the other decrease in camber if the subframe has moved across the car.

He is correct in as much as the camber when measured at both sides, can be equalised by moving the front lower subframe across the car - but maybe he has found that they was not enough free movement in the bolt holes to do this, maybe ask what the camber on both sides is and work out what the theoretical equalised camber could be - not I would think would answer the question as to if something had been bent, I'm guessing that the "problem" side has too little camber, ie almost upright or angled inwards. You should have been given a print out after paying for that work to be done, so will be able to see a "before" and "after" set of readings that have been recorded.

Have you ever had any other repair work carried out at the front of this car, ie worn out parts replaced and if so what exactly?

 

[andreasaravis]

Very informative read. The only work up front that has been done is a lot of new track control arms and that is it.

Here are three printouts of the wheel alignment. The first one was just a check from Kwik fit, and the other two are a before and after from a 4 wheel 3D alignment.

I’d added another one of the work that was carried out by the wheel alignment people also

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[RUM4MO]

Hum, front camber with standard suspension, according to Haynes for a 6R Polo is -28' +/-30' which gives a max camber of roughly -1deg and a min of 0deg while allowing a difference side to side of 30' which is 0.5deg. With sports suspension the limits are -39' +/-30' which gives a max camber of -1.15deg and a min of -0.15deg. Maybe with time these Haynes limits have been changed slightly.
So, in theory with your readings of 0.0deg and -2.03deg, there looks like there is scope to equalise the camber side to side and still be in spec by moving the subframe across - buy they can't do this.
Now they should know a lot more about this than me and you, so really you have to trust them or spend more money taking it elsewhere.
If there had been any parts of the suspension bent or kinked, as far as I can think, you would never be able to, in theory anyway, equalise the camber side to side and still be spec - plus any accidental damage, in my mind, would have normally bent parts in and so leave you being unable to get it back into spec.
One thing though, something quite serious has happened to this car during its lifetime and that has lead to this misalignment.

 

[andreasaravis]

Looking at the diagram of the alignment, it does look as though the camber is all in one side, and moving the subframe would straighten her up but this has been done and it didn’t work.

I don’t think the car has been in an accident, the garage did look over her for signs of structural damage or it being in an accident but could find anything that looked sinister.

It’s a hard call for me, the garage I took her too are automotive experts located in the centre of Norwich, even thou it was the first time I’ve used them, they where very informative about the situation and what could cause it and what’s needed to fix it. Do I now change the suspension legs and hope that the camber on both sides straightens up or take her somewhere else and see what they can do? I just don’t think that changing both legs with equalise the camber :-(


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[RUM4MO]

For me, just sitting roughly 300 miles North and armed with only my computer, it looks like they did not manage to move the front subframe across at all, maybe just moved one end of it fore/aft relative to the other - or the subframe had already been moved as far to one side as it is possible within the clearance holes, and that side is the RHS.
If I had paid good money for that work, though maybe you initially thought that it only needed the subframe moving to equalise the camber, I would have expected someone to have worked out exactly what the root cause of that alignment problem was - but there again if you only asked them to check and adjust it, then they have done their work, I think that you said that they wanted to start replacing some parts - well that should move this task on and if they found that that did not change anything, I'd expect that they would move on to change something else - but see the first wrong move as being their fault as they are experts,and so limit charging you indefinitely until they had sorted it out, ie they should be willing to take the hit on wrongly carried out work - though probably not 100% of it as no one is a proper expert.

Edit:- maybe you should get this car up onto a set of 4 axle stands and start taking some measurements to make sure that the frame is still true and that the subframe is over to one side and check to see if there is any evidence that the subframe has moved for any number of reasons by checking the condition of rust proofing and paint at each end of the subframe.

 

[andreasaravis]

The garage wanted to charge me around £800 for two new shocks and 2 track control arms and to realign the car. This is all too much for me to spend, so I have the lower arms fitted at our local garage at much cheaper rate they wanted to charge.

I’ve just found this, and it seems as though the subframe can be moved to change camber. I’m going to take the car to our local garage and ask them to sort the car...they have alignment there but it’s only for two wheels. I don’t think the alignment equipment will be as good as the other garage I used in the first place but I have to be confident that they will be able to move the subframe to balance the camber.

http://www.vwwatercooled.com.au/forums/f128/why-you-cannot-do-wheel-alignment-6r-polo-61409.html




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[RUM4MO]

All or at least most of the Skoda Fabia, VW Polo and SEAT Ibiza forums have been full of people saying "you can't do a 4 wheel re-alignment" on these cars or any of them from roughly 2000 > 2018 - but that is not strictly true, what you get from a proper 4 wheel alignment check is:- it checks the car for damage/distortion - ie build error or accident damage, checks the fixed rear beam measures up okay, then checks and adjusts the front wheels wrt the rear beam so that the thrust line is down the centre line of the car. If that can not be done to bring the car into spec then something has been bent/damaged.
As hinted in that write up, replacing the ARB and/or the steering rack means dropping down the front subframe and so alignment is easily lost, VW Group used to suggest fitting eccentric threaded dowels after removing the first bolt etc so that the previously fixed position was preserved - that it seems did not work very well, well not 100% so a costly 4 wheel re-alignment was still needed!

Edit:- I have replaced the front shock absorbers and springs and top bearings etc on my older daughter's late 2009 Ibiza, and with taking lots of care to get the lower swivels back in the original position and making sure that the strut tops settled back into the centre of the fixing hole on each side, and that car still steers okay and has not ended up with any uneven tyre wear, which is good! Doing that same job on my wife's old 2002 Polo meant needing a full 4 wheel re-alignment and even my good indie made a mess of that task once ending up with 2 quickly wrecked new Michelin sports tyres!!

Another Edit:- another weakness on these cars, Fabia/Polo/Ibiza of this type is the steering rod inner knuckle joint! I will be replacing both sides on my daughter's late 2009 Ibiza SC in April when she is away on holiday - oh joy!