ueww40

My left front tire started to wear excessively on the inside. My steering does not pull to either side, the steering wheel is perfectly centered and the car runs straight as an arrow. Tire size is 265/70R/16 and I keep pressure at 36 psi on all 4 wheels. I had the alignment checked at a Firestone tire center and the left front reading was -1.1, which they said was borderline out of specs (-1.0 is the limit). The alignment tech was at a loss of his wisdom, especially since my entire front end shows no signs of wear or damage and is tight and solid. They told me that it would not really make a difference if they brought the camber within specs because the difference is so minute. So why does my left front shows signs of uneven wear????

RLXXI

Find another alignment tech. Alignment was one of my specialties before I went fleet. If it's out of spec it WILL wear the tires unevenly. Perhaps he was lazy or scared because of what needs to be done to make your truck front end adjustable.

Here's the specs for your truck and how to adjust it, they will have to remove square plates and install cams.





What I see if you have the 4x2 a spec of -0.3 +- 0.7 that 0.7 is above and below center spec which is -0.3 so that means you split the 0.7 to go both ways you can go as low as -0.65 or as high as +0.05.

Common mistake, with that said you are more than borderline out of spec. If it were my truck I would just zero out the camber. 0.0


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ueww40

RNLCOMP, thanks for your expertise and detailed explanation of my problem. I did the math and everything you said seems to make perfect sense. However, I don't think the alignment tech at Firestone was incompetent. I think they just go by the book and what the machine tells them it should be and as long as it is within the margin of tolerance its good enough for them and being .1 degree off tolerance seems not worth the trouble to them. But looking at your specs I see what you mean. You are probably right that he did not want to mess with it because there is no adjustment possible unless you do the cam modification. Btw, I did not know either until now that Ford did that and that this cam mod was necessary to adjust camber. But thanks again for your explanation. Now I know what I am facing and I will deal with it using your specs.

RLXXI

Welcome, you will need two cam kits if you want full adjustability on both sides, there are 2 cams per kit.

Napa use to carry them in stock. But you may have to order them.

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ueww40

Rnlcomp, I am confused now. There are 2 cams per kit and I need 2 kits for full adjustability. We are talking right and left front. So that's 1 kit per side. So you are saying that I need 2 cams on each side. I know where 1 cam is going. I saw it on your diagram, where is the other one going?

RLXXI

The upper control arm has 2 mounting points, one cam per mount. 1 kit has 2 cams. 2 kits = 4 cams.

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ueww40

Got it! Before asking more stupid questions I will jack up my left front, take the wheel off and look at the whole thing. I am sure it will make perfect sense once I see it.
Thanks!

ueww40

Rnlcomp, I removed the left front wheel and looked at the upper control arm. I saw 2 big excentric cams on the inside of the mounting points, where the bolt heads are. On the outside of the mounting points where the nuts are I saw 2 fixed plates as seen in your diagram. What does that mean? Mod has already been done or do I have to install 2 more cams instead of the plates, where the nuts are. I uploaded a diagram showing what this looks like.

Tackle

Sounds like they've already got them on if there is a big offset washer looking excentric cam.

RLXXI

You might be able to get by without the cam kits but you will have to take that square plate out and replace it with a large flat washer.

It's been my experience that one cam won't be enough when doing the alignment, tends to bend rather than rotate.

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