MacPherson: camber adjustment

Hello.

To adjust camber on MacPherson front system we have at least 2 options:

1. Adjustable upper mount.

2. Special bolts for knuckle and shock absorber

Is it correct, that option 2 is preferable to use? Because in this case lower and upper ball joints stay on it's place and king pin inclination isn't changed.

But if we use option 1 - it will increase king pin inclination that will cause less camber when cornering?

Thanks,

Alexander

Hi Alexander, yes the two methods you've mentioned can both be used to alter camber. A third option is to alter the length of the lower control arm. You're correct that altering camber via the strut top will also impact the KPI, however in reality this isn't likely to be a major issue and is generally the easier and more common way of making fine camber adjustments. In many instances you'll find that there's a limit to how much negative camber you can add with an eccentric camber bolt of offset camber washers where the hub bolts to the strut because you will run into issues with clearance between the strut and the inside of the tyre/wheel.

My personal approach is to do as much camber correction as I can at the hub using camber washers and then fine tune my camber with the strut top. Provided the caster angle is greater than the KPI the net effect will still be camber gain as the wheel is turned.

Andre, thank you for a such intelligible answer again.