camber bolts......do I need them?

I have a 2007 legacy gt it has 155k miles, it is lowered and inch. Has been that way for almost three years.

 

I just had new tires installed on Tuesday at jack williams, got a good deal. they couldn't do the alignment that day. They were afraid they would break something since it was so cold that day and everything was frozen.

 

Fast forward to today, I work at a dealership figured I could get the alignment done while I'm at work. Takes them all day to get to my car, which is another story. They put it on the rack said they can't do the alignment without a camber kit. If they did it without one it will throw the front wheels out of alignment as soon as they pull it down. At that moment I am thinking wtf. I have had an alignment done multiple times in the past after it was lowered. Why would I need that now.

 

My question is are they just a shitty service department and have no clue what they're doing. Or is what they are saying is actually correct and I should look into a camber kit?

this is a picture of what their readout was. I have no clue how to read one of these is anyone could help, Thanks.

My question is are they just a shitty service department and have no clue what they're doing?

 

Yes. Yes, they are.

 

You should be able to get about -1 camber up front with the stock bolts, which would be better than the -0.5 you have now. Rear camber is fine, and typical for an otherwise stock lgt lowered 1". You want toe to be 0 degrees all around and for your thrust angle to be 0. Your car has plenty of adjustment to make this happen without needing more parts.

 

I'm sure it's cheap and convenient to have it done where you work, but honestly it'll be better in the long run if you just go to a good alignment shop. I've never been to any dealer, ever, that has a competent alignment tech that works there and really understands what they're doing with suspension.

It looks to me like they either didn't feel like doing much to your car, or(more likely), their alignment tech has absolutely zero idea what the hell they're doing.

 

Take it to a god alignment shop, if you're only lowered 1" you'll be able to get everything reasonably in spec. For reference, my outback is lowered about 3.5" and a competent alignment shop was able to get -2° camber and 0.01° toe all around fairly easily.

Thank you for the helpful information. I took the car to a local shop. They're telling me I need a camber kit for the front.

 

I left out earlier that my job said I need one for the rear.

 

So my conclusion so far is. I don't like their answer. They are at least willing to do the alignment even though my front passenger camber will be off .06 from what they showed me.

 

Lol now I'll be doing more research for a good alignment shop.

I have an Outback and assumed it's the same as Legacy as far as what's adjustable. Is there Camber adjustment up front? I was under the impression there is not. I know for certain the only thing adjustable in the REAR is the Toe, and when you change Toe the Camber also changes.

 

The best alignment shop can still only work with what's adjustable. If it's only Toe, there's nothing they can do about Camber so get some cheap camber bolts ($30) if you really need your alignment to be nailed to spec. Camber kit for the rear is more like $50. Both are optional. You can also keep toe and thrust angle at 0, camber will end up at whatever it ends up at, and rotate your tires every 5000 miles.

I don't know why people are so afraid of some camber.

 

What do you use the car for and how do you drive?

 

The front should literally need nothing, the rear will need a camber kit or adjustable links to get it into "spec," but depending on what you use the car for I don't see an issue with rear camber in the -1.5 to -1.8 range.

I generally run at least 1 degree of negative up front, and around a half a degree of negative in the rear.

numbers don't look bad. what tires did you get installed? Looks like toe is your biggger problem. Given the mileage on the car, your issues stem more from wear than needing a new camber kit.

if you are rotating your tires on the correct schedule, you should not notice any issues.

I am not afraid of having some camber. I put on continental extreme contact dws06. I don't track the car I am not looking for a specific dialed in alignment. I want to make sure I don't need to add something that isn't necessary because shops are lazy and look for a quick fix. From what I am reading sounds like I don't need or at least not yet.

correct.

Many shops are not familiar with how Subarus are made and don't realize that one of the bolts in the front strut is a camber bolt. They think they are just normal bolts.

 

I took my car to a Ford dealer (Subaru dealer was over 100miles away) and they called and told me I needed a camber kit and they couldn't align it until they had one. I explained to them that the top strut bolt that mounts it to the the wheel bearing housing was a camber bolt and once turned, it would change camber. An hour later, they aligned my car with no issues. They didn't realized the top strut bolt was in fact an adjustable bolt until I told them. They had not had experience with that design before.