Rear toe out of spec......Causes?

[02chuck]

2003 Boxster S 55k mi

Put new tires on the Boxster S, Had the CV joint boots replaced.

Took it to get aligned.

Best that it can be adjusted to is about 0.7 and 1.3 degrees of rear toe in.

TO best of our knowledge the car has not been hit. Bought it with a clean Carfax, when under the car

there is no sign of trauma.

So what do we look for or at?

Opinions and Knowledge appreciated

Thanks Folks

Chuck

[ericinboca]

Three items come to mind....

The eccentric adjusting bolt where the arm attaches to the subframe might be bent. You have to take it out to see.

Note that negative camber and toe are related. The more negative camber, the longer the toe adjusting arm needs to be be to keep the wheel from being toed-in too much. And the opposite is also true - positive camber effectively lenghtens the arm, giving you more toe out.

The subframe on some cars seems to be out of center too.

[02chuck]

Three items come to mind....

The eccentric adjusting bolt where the arm attaches to the subframe might be bent. You have to take it out to see.

Note that negative camber and toe are related. The more negative camber, the longer the toe adjusting arm needs to be be to keep the wheel from being toed-in too much. And the opposite is also true - positive camber effectively lenghtens the arm, giving you more toe out.

The subframe on some cars seems to be out of center too.

Had the engine replaced last spring so that might be a cause for the subframe being off center. Yes I read about the toe and camber being dependent.

Also got under the car on the lift this morning and the toe control arms look like someone might have used them to tie down the car when transported.

I figure they should look the same, but there seems to be a twist in the left one(the left is the one with the most toe) and the right has a different twist.

From looking at the pic's that I can find they should be straight. So it looks like I will buying some arms, thinking of the adjustable ones so when I get around

to putting some suspension on I can get adjusted correctly.

Thanks

Chuck

[4agdtym]

The toe arms are supposed to be straight. There are two other issues which might be causing your problem. First is that the camber has more adjustability than the toe will allow. If you want more camber than toe allows, you will need to replace toe arms with adjustables. The other problem can be the inverted towers that hold the toe arm concentric. Those towers are not very stable - only held at the lower end by the sheet aluminum plate under the trans. Pedro's Garage makes a support that stiffens the towers and provides a more stable mount for the toe arms. If you have a bent arm, of course, you will need to replace it.

I just replaced my suspension and have used toe arms if you'd like an inexpensive alternative to see if that will fix the problem: $35 each plus shipping.

Good luck.

[prico82]

2003 Boxster S 55k mi Put new tires on the Boxster S, Had the CV joint boots replaced. Took it to get aligned. Best that it can be adjusted to is about 0.7 and 1.3 degrees of rear toe in. TO best of our knowledge the car has not been hit. Bought it with a clean Carfax, when under the car there is no sign of trauma. So what do we look for or at? Opinions and Knowledge appreciated Thanks Folks Chuck

 

Hi 02chuck, 

I hate replying to threads that are over 4 years old. But I have the same situation. 

2001 Boxster S, 53K miles. Put mew tires on. Just did my CV boots. Took it to get aligned and the rear is toed in 0.3in on one side and 0.7in on the other. They could not do anythings else as the eccentrics were turned all the way. I too got a car that had a new engine (only 4k miles on it). Exact same situation as you and same result.

 

The only difference is, my toe control arms do not appear bent. Was hoping you could share with me if you found out if the bent toe arms you had were the root cause of the excessive toe-in. If not, how did you solve the problem?

 

I made measurements of the height of my car cause the alignment shop asked me if my car had been lowered. It appears to be all stock suspension. But when I measured the height according to the instruction of the porsche 986 repair manual, my car is at the low end of the tolerance for height in the back, and below the low end of t he tolerance in the front. Not sure if this could be related to the new engine???

[Flat6speed]

So what was the root cause for toe being out of spec? I recently replaced a half axle and now my alignment is out. Two different shops could not dial in the toe.

Regards,

Scott

[prico82]

for me, the rear toe was off by alot, but on both sides which led me to suspect that the issue was worn suspension bushings instead of a bent part (i thought a bent part would be less likely to manifest itself on both sides). Also, i did not have alignment specs before i replaced the axle boots, so i couldnt prove that this axle repair was the cause. the alignment may have already been off beforehand and i didnt notice, afterall, the car still drove great.

so what i did was order new toe control arms - the aftermarket adjustable kind. they were about 400 for the pair. after alignment, i was rather certain this was the cause because the alignment shop told me they did not have to adjust the length of the new arm to make it shorter than the original one to account for the excessive toe in. they just turned the eccentric bolts slightly. So, it seems like the original bushings were worn.

hope this helps...

[Flat6speed]

That's great feedback!  Thank you!  Where did you get the new toe control arms if you don't mind me asking?

[prico82]

i did a lot of research, and basically decided to stay away from some of the cheap stuff on ebay. what i ended up buying was this:

http://shop.tunersmotorsports.com/?product=trs-rear-toe-link-control-arm-pair-986987996997

they look identical to the ones sold by tarrett at $100 more. i spoke to Mike at tuneRS and he explained to me that tarrett sells them more expensive because the tarrett ones have gone through a certification process for major racing and because of that, they are being value priced. i dont race my car, so i could care less. i was very happy with the ones i got, they really look like high quality parts. there was a minor hickup however, again, minor:

the aluminum spacers where the spherical bearing are were too big by about 0.009" for each side. they could not be installed in my 986 boxster because of this. the solution was about 30 mins of HAND SANDING by me and a friend. my friend did 2 spacers and i did 2 spacers. aluminum sands pretty easily, and so i did not want to do it on a machine and risk damaging. after hand sanding on 220 grit sand paper, the parts slipped in nicely on the car. i am very happy with the end result. i actually got the arms for $350 + about $10 shipping. not sure if the tarrett ones would have had the same issue, but again, this was minor, and for a $100 less i did not mind 30mins of my time.

[Flat6speed]

Thanks again!

 

Scott