New member, gonna have many questions!

[Guest]

Agreed. I think Mac's wants you to think the shims are Tbird specific since they are an "antique specialty" parts shop....and rightly so when it comes to things like preformed weatherstripping and other items. Flat shims are another matter, as I have the ability to create my own, and it looks to me like they would be easy enough to make with a simple drill press and saw. I'm going to sort through our scrap bin at work and see what I can come up with.

[Yadkin]

Back in my Fox chassis days I developed a method to align my car using monofilament line between the front tires and the rears. This works as long as your rear is straight. Adjust camber with a carpenter's level. Caster wasn't adjustable.

Dave, is there any adjustment in the rear end, if the car "dog tracks"?

[simplyconnected]

...Dave, is there any adjustment in the rear end, if the car "dog tracks"?

Dog tracking can be tricky. When I worked in Dearborn Frame Plant, we made frames for full size and station wagon Fords. There were a 'few that got away' so to speak, a frame with one side as a station wagon and the other as a regular car. This produced so much dog tracking it was visible to all at interstate highway speeds.

Even though one rear sub frame was longer than the other, the axle still fit. Simply put: The geometry was wrong.

Dog Tracking can also result from unequal loads on the wheels. For instance, the two front springs are not matched and are not close. One bears down much more than the other.

At the assembly plant, as the vehicle is going out the door, each wheel is weighed. The sum of the numbers equal 'vehicle weight'. If one number is extremely heavy or light something is wrong in the suspension and it needs to be corrected.

The same holds true for Squarebirds and ALL cars. Perhaps one leaf spring is sagging and it needs to be shimmed at the axle. Scales tell the truth when visual inspection can be deceiving.

A well-balanced suspension performs beautifully in the snow. - Dave

[Yadkin]

I've never seen a TBird dog track, but Ford vans seem.to, a lot.

[simplyconnected]

Dog tracking happens in varying degrees of severity. For instance, when your leaf springs are mounted there is a little slop in that locating pin. If you pull the springs one way the car drives slightly different than if you pull it the other way. That means the axle may not be 'square' to the front wheels, but 'close enough'.

So which is correct? Get out your measuring devices. The rear axle has 'stacks' of tolerances in the mounting holes, bushings, leaf length (between the front frame mounting and the pins) and mounting plates. Hopefully, a good front end alignment will 'square up' all four wheels. This is where it becomes important to use all the shims for proper 'whole car' adjustment, not just the front end. Most alignment shops don't weigh the wheels, which is important as well.

We adjust valve spring height/tension as a matter of good valve train tuning. Why don't we also adjust suspension heights and tensions (like Chrysler cars do with their torsion bar suspension)? Because it's good enough as is. - Dave