Camber misalignment and rear wheel parts

Yes, good you're aware of what's happening when an alignment shop does not have the professional expertise they need. So, at the time you were sending me the answer, I was at the shops and in the predicament you were mentioning. I booked three appointments: one was with a body shop down in Lexington 30 miles from where we are (but he is yet to confirm), one at NTB for regular alignment and one at Firestone for visual and computerized check. To make the story short, Firestone wants me to wait 3 and 1/2 hours (I was there at 2pm; they meant after closing! Am like "okay forget it"). I drove up to NTB: Really nice spacious shop with young college age lads and two women getting their cars fixed. The guy takes my car and refuses to charge me because ("you're only getting it checked out, right"). Okay fine (I know when I don't pay; something isn't normal- either a blessing or a curse). Long story short, the guy is really nice but young with very little experience (he forget to check for suspension or anything else besides mounting the car to the rack and getting the readings on a screen). I was happy he got something done for me. But quite honestly, I could not get much answered. He was kind enough to text me the "screen shot" (which I include for you to examine).
Now, I have done front toe alignment the old way many times before, and I seem to get it really good every time (but not without trial and error). This one is something else. Here is my understanding of the results NTB gave me. Please correct me where applicable because I tried to ask and couldn't get answers.

1. I cannot correct Caster on this car, so I am going to leave it alone until I replaced everything undercarriage

2. Camber: the reading shows -0.2 degrees on the right and -0.1 degrees on the left. The manual states 0 degrees 40 minutes +/- 45 minutes (I understand this to be +0.08 degrees to +1.58 degrees interval; this means the camber cannot be negative or leaning towards the center and must be leaning outward away from the center by 0.08 to 1.58 degrees). In this alignment image, I learned the camber is incorrectly leaning towards the center on both sides (contributing to additional outer edge tire wear), and it needs to be adjusted (which I will do when I replace the suspensions). Either I am totally off or these numbers need to be halved if the numbers are for total camber? I doubt I am correct but I tried.

3. Looking at this image, the toe-in numbers are way out of spec: the manual for this car states 0.14 +/- 0.12 inches (again I am assuming these numbers are total toe-in) meaning the toe on each side (as well as the total toe) must be positive. In this case, I learned that the wheels are toed in almost equally but to the extreme (+2.35 degrees on the right and +2.40 degrees on the left). Now, these are in degrees and the specs 0.14 +/- 0.12 are given in inches. So, I went ahead and calculated the angles equivalent to these numbers, and I get the front wheels have to have positive toe-in between 0.26" and 0.02" or +0.57 degrees and +0.044 degrees (again that's total toe-in). Since the right toe is +2.35 degrees, it needs to be reduced to somewhere between +0.57 and +0.04 and divided by 2 or between +0.29 and +0.02 degrees. Likewise, the left front toe is +2.40 degrees and needs to be reduced to the same or between +0.29 and +0.02 degrees. Am I close?

Now, I asked him about the rear wheel and whether the axle beam needs to be replaced; he said: he didn't "feel" it would make any difference "because the problem is a front toe misalignment." Also, I should mention that the tire shops who replaced tires on this car when my sister drove it between 2003 and 2007 decided to replace the original tires on this car (165 70 R13) with 165 80 R13 on all sides except the front driver, they replaced it with 155 80 R13. The tires I have placed on this car recently are all 175 70 R13. With 175 70 R13 the car drove straight and still had the outer edge wear out quickly. Before going to get the alignment reading today, I replaced the front driver tire with the tire she had in the garage (155 80 R13), and at that point the car pulled to the left noticeably messing up the alignment. I was running out of time and decided to keep this tire on while they did the alignment checks. I told the guy about all this (he said "oh, I forgot to check the tires too and that will change all the numbers I got on this screen"). Then he left and asked his friend and came back to tell me "no, it won't make any difference since the computer is reading off the wheel not the tire." I was out of energy to say anything anymore and left. And here I am reporting. I appreciate your patience with this lengthy explanation. But please, let me know what you think and if I should proceed to reduce the toe-in on both front wheels.

James

Thank you so much for your encouragement. I am glad you confirmed the numbers and the diagnostics. So, you're saying NTB did the alignment check correctly and the tire itself being off the recommended size was irrelevant to the computer readings? Thanks again (without your help I couldn't have figured it out).

James

When she gave me the car to work on it last year, the car had three tires (165 80 R13) and one driver side front tire (155 80 R13). They were all bold. I replaced all 4 with 175 70 R13 tires. I did alignment and the car was driven few hundred miles (there was no pulling and the alignment appeared fine until I noticed tire wear). I intentionally (after reviewing her tire records) picked up the 155 80 R13 from storage and installed it on the front driver side. At that point, the car clearly lost alignment and pulled to the left and the steering wheel had to be placed at "2 O' clock" to drive straight down the road. But to clear up any doubts now, I got rid of the 155 80 R13 and installed the 175 70 R13 back where it was on the driver front side and drove the car. It re -gained its alignment and drove straight (the wheel being 100 % centered). I came back home and re did the alignment (just last night). I turned the inner tie rod equally 4 full turns ccw on both sides. The car is again driving straight and not pulling at all. I called NTB today, he told me to bring it back in again to put it up on the rack to get new alignment readings. I will take it to NTB tomorrow. In my last reply, I was asking you if the tire size makes a difference in the alignment readings that the computer produces (meaning, does the alignment machine read off the wheel or the wheel and tire?) As far as why it pulled to the left and lost alignment with a thinner and higher tire on the driver side, [lol] I told my sister, "why did they make her wear a high heel on one side- narrow and tall, she couldn't walk right!" She said, "it was long ago and couldn't remember other than they couldn't find the right size!) Of course, I was joking but [maybe] that was it for this car. Because the 155 80 tire is clearly not meant for this car, I decide to forget about it, get rid of it and to focus on whether this car has some problems with its frame before I replaced all wheels, control arms, sway bar or suspensions etc. I did some random measurements on my own because the body shop hasn't called me yet to confirm my appointment. But I could not get a single measurement to equal another (except the height of the struts and shock absorbers when the wheels were off the ground- which did not do me much good since no compression was applied to them). I did all measurements in the driveway, but the driveway isn't straight all the way; it slopes- I couldn't be confident about the numbers I got. The strange part was this: when I lifted the front wheels and let the car rest on car jacks up front, the rear passenger wheel and its tire always hung in the air by about half inch while the left rear tire touched the ground firmly. I have not an idea why (something isn't right).

Yes, I am glad we're on the same page now. So, I will go ahead and replace the undercarriage after I get reliable measurements from the body shop (just because I can't figure out why the car isn't sitting even on car jacks). I will let you know what they tell me about the frame and or current suspensions and wheel system. Again as always great advice and replies. Thanks

James