Mr. Lance W. Recommended Alignment

This alignment is the result of experimentation with the factory numbers to improve road feel and to reduce inside edge wear on the rear tires that is common with the factory settings.  These settings will add grip at the front and dramatically improve the feedback to the driver in the steering wheel. They will also reduce or eliminate inside edge wear on the rear tires, and I have gone as far as 24,000 miles on a set of Bridgestone S-02s with these settings.  The car will still under steer slightly, but the aggressive driver will find much more predictable handling and significantly better feedback from the car.  Obviously, these settings are still compromised for street use.  Autocross, road race, and drag race competitors can use these as a baseline, but will probably require somewhat different settings to be competitive.

1. What is a Good Street/Lance W. Alignment?
Front:

Rear:

(on 255/40R17 tires this rear toe equates to .090 deg, i.e. .045 deg per side)
(on 275/40R17 tires this rear toe equates to .088 deg, i.e. .044 deg per side)

The Front and Rear Toe are critical to tire wear, even small deviations from spec may cause unusual wear patterns or excessive wear.

 

2. What is the Stock Toyota Alignment?
Front:

Rear:

 

 

To Calculate Degrees of Toe When Given mm of Toe:
*Note that this is dependent upon the wheel diameter and tire diameter

Formula: Calculate the Wheel + Tire Diameter (in mm) for the stock rear wheel + Tire
Example: (2 * tire width * aspect ratio / 100) + (wheel diameter) = wheel + tire diameter
                (2 * 255mm * .4) + (17 * 25.4) = 635.8 mm

Here the goal is 1 mm of total toe in. (This is 0.5 mm on the driver rear tire and 0.5 mm on the passenger rear tire.)

We want to calculate the angle each side wheel + tire must deviate from a line parallel to the centerline of the car.
arcsin(0.5 mm / 635.8 mm) = .045 deg
.045 deg per side * 2 sides = .09 deg total toe in

 

 

 

supra_su.gif (5342 bytes)