NTB fail. According to them caster will never casue a pull.

[Mach1]

caster naturally tries to find center on steering, if you have a greater amount on the right front than the left, the force will overcome the centering force from the other side, very simple. This is the case in ANY type of suspension.

That makes sense, thanks for explaining it

[CJ]

Alot of solid front axle vehicles have a adjusatment for camber in the upper ball joints and or the ball joint bushing.

I have never seen that before on Dana series axles, at least none of the ones I've worked on.

[Cooter]

lol @ the old "been doing this shit wrong for almost 20 yrs!" guys

[CJ]

lol @ the old "been doing this shit wrong for almost 20 yrs!" guys

Really what they mean is "what the fuck is caster?"

[Cooter]

I had a kid I was doing an exhaust/programmer deal with and he was having a local muffler shop install the new system for him.

I met up with hi that morning, and I was showing the guy at the muffler shop the best places to cut the factory system to get it off the quickest/easiest

he was like "this ain't my first rodeo" Ok, just trying to help! LOL

then he starts trying to remove all of the sensors from the exhaust, and I'm like "you can just leave those, just unplug them from the harness"

"you can't remove the O2 sensors, it won't run right"

"yeah it will, this programmer gets rid of all that"

"no it won't, donnie dumblefuck down the road knows all about these"

"ok, whatever you say, just unplug them from the harness kthx welcome to your 2nd rodeo

[stephen4785]

On any truck that has a solid front axle you can adjust total caster. You have to adjust each ecentric bolt to the same mark. Some guys will try to adjust on bolt so that the sheet looks good but their twisting the axle to get it. After a few miles the axle will twist back to it's normal placement and the bushing in the control arms give out.
So if you have 1.2/1.8 the .5 difference will always be the same but you can change the total caster.
A lot of guys who do alignments dont understand the concept and I didnt expect this guy to understand it either. But telling me that caster isnt adjustable on my truck and sating that caster wont cause a pull is completely ridiculous.
Solid front axle trucks dont have a camber adjustment. You can swap ball joints and change it or change the individual caster on each wheel by swaping in some degreed ball joints. The only problem with that is the ball joints wear out faster.

[stephen4785]

Can someone explain how caster would effect pull if the suspension is not going up and down? Like I said, I can understand under bump but if it's static I don't see it pulling.

I tell people this-Caster is how the weight of the vehicle sits on the wheels. Imagine if your pushing a wheel barrow. If you pick it up a little and try to steer it it doent want to turn very well. If you pick it up too high then it steers well but its uncontrollable. You want that happy medium of control and easy of steering.
Your caster changes when you hit a bumb and this is known as "bump steer". All vehicle have it but some are a lot more noticeable than others.

[stephen4785]

As stated they were likely out a bit or in the "red" and he didn't want you freaking out because of the color of ink on the paper. Caster will cause a pull but won't wear tires. if the split is close and it won't wear tires most techs will set the toe and let it go. ? Is does it pull. If not then no need to freak out. If they set camber and toe and the truck doesn't pull then you got what you paid for.

I told the service writer before they started that I wanted to know what the caster/camber measurements were. He said ok. Then I got the sheet that didnt have caster.
It boils down to that caster is a pita to adjust compared to the other measurements. On most alignment machines you have to center the alignment heads and do a 20 degree sweep to the right then left and then re-center. The newer optical machines are alot easier because you do the sweep or roll the vehicle back and forth then it gives you a real time measurement of caster. Toe is the easiest so a lot of guys will adjust toe(known in the industry as "set toe and go") and say that the other angles arent adjustable and hope that the customer doesnt know. These same techs will also tell customers that their frames are bent or that they need every front end part to get a good alignment. That way the customer gets a quote for a high amount and wont pay for the job. Im not saying thats the case every time because a 20 year old car that has never had any maintenance probably needs the front end rebuilt. But either thats what happended in my case or the guy really doesnt know what he's doing.

[stephen4785]

I told the guy that Im not trying to be a pita. If I can see what the caster is then Ill know if it needs to be adjusted or that the axles is bent. He didnt save my truck in the alignment machines computer so in order to get the caster measurement he would've had to put my truck back on the alignment rack and he's paid by the job not the hour. I told him dont worry about it right now and that I would take the truck and see how the alignment came out.
Low and behold my truck pulls to the right to the point that I have to counter steer to the left(steering wheel has to be held at 10 o'clock). Which is something else that pisses me off because that tells me he didnt test drive it at all.

[turbos66coupe]

I told the guy that Im not trying to be a pita. If I can see what the caster is then Ill know if it needs to be adjusted or that the axles is bent. He didnt save my truck in the alignment machines computer so in order to get the caster measurement he would've had to put my truck back on the alignment rack and he's paid by the job not the hour. I told him dont worry about it right now and that I would take the truck and see how the alignment came out.
Low and behold my truck pulls to the right to the point that I have to counter steer to the left(steering wheel has to be held at 10 o'clock). Which is something else that pisses me off because that tells me he didnt test drive it at all.

Well there you have a problem. Shity work is shity work and should be treated as such. I'm not saying what he did was okay cause its not. You should always atleast check caster , camber and toe. Hell the ntb machines are usually new and very nice. They can tell you every measurment in amatter of 10 min with very little effort. Ntb should warranty there alignments for 12/12 so take it to another have them check it and when its wrong have them fix it for free.

[Grape]

I have never seen that before on Dana series axles, at least none of the ones I've worked on.

You should see a 9" rear end housing with 2 degrees neg camber and toed out 1/4" on the right rear.....

[irbs]

Well there you have a problem. Shity work is shity work and should be treated as such. I'm not saying what he did was okay cause its not. You should always atleast check caster , camber and toe. Hell the ntb machines are usually new and very nice. They can tell you every measurment in amatter of 10 min with very little effort. Ntb should warranty there alignments for 12/12 so take it to another have them check it and when its wrong have them fix it for free.

All alignments at NTB have some type of warranty. The minimum alignment purchased has a 6 month or 6000 mile warranty. There are many NTB's out there that are being ran by people who just don't care about anything other than their paycheck. I am the service manager of the NTB in The Colony. Many of our managers or service managers are people who have been brought right off the sales floor. As for others we were picked from the back for proving ourselves as workers. I cant speak for all NTB's but there are many of us here in DFW that are buddies and we all run a very honest and knowledgable operations.

Caster is the one adjustment on an alignment that we fight with the most. So many cars come in that people will nail a curb and they just want an alignment. Many times caster isn't adjustable or will be way to far off to get into spec. My customers will be brought out to the car and explained as to why we cant get this adjustment in and at that moment they can choose to continue with the alignment or not.

I understand everyone's anger with NTB and it is always being addressed with people higher up. Good luck with getting everything taken care of!

Ethan

[Redd]

Go to franks wheel alignment in down town ft worth... we use the for all our state trucks, my buddy that runs custom shop that dose alot of air ride trucks takes them there and we never have issues.

Franks mainly dose big rigs, but they will do anything that can be aligned. I highly recomend them. They do everything the old fashion way as well. No computers

Ive used them as long as ive been driving.

They also have the lil tool box calenders with boobies haha

Franks
2800 W. 5th St. Ft. Worth, Tx
817-336-7863

its behind the old montgomery ward building thats been turned into condos/resutrants.