What's In An Alignment

There are two companies that do race tuning and actively support the racers in our local Porsche Club. I don't really know much about either of them, except that they both show up at events with their semi trailers and are therefore readily available to their customers.

A couple of weeks ago I chose one of them to install my Eibach springs and sway bars. We lowered the front about an inch and the rear about a half inch. But in lowering the car, we were not able to get to the alignment specs we wanted in the rear. We just ran out of adjustment room.

Then I went to pick the brains of the other group, for an upcoming article on alignments. According to the guy there, they have lowered plenty of Boxsters without being challenged by any resulting alignment problems. Hmmm-m-m.

So, next Monday I'll be at the second shop, camera in hand and asking pesky questions, while they do an alignment on the car. At the end of the week, I leave for Mid America Motorplex, in Iowa for another weekend with the NASA gang. The new alignment will be a compromise by design. Not enough negative camber for a race car, but more than you need an a street car. Could provide a bit more wear on the street than is optimum, but I don't want to give up on better track handling, either.

We will also be addressing a bit of what seems to be unpredictable oversteer. I'm wondering if that has to do with excessive toe out on the rear. We'll see what they say.