Can anyone give me some numbers to go for alighnment for my cooper when work is done,i have a 2002 cooper with 205-45-17 wheels and Koni fsd,IE adjustable camber plates and an H-Sport 19 mm sway bar and all poly bushes to be installed very shortly,i like some numbers to do the alighnment that would primiarily be for street use with ocasional spirited driving. I have searched and looked in the Hanes manual but nothing .Thanks

 

Ok no takers on sugested alighnment numbers,anyone know the stock alighnment numbers for a 2002 cooper i'm shure the installer could make adjustments from there and keep it civilized for the street,i note that IE fixed plate owners are not complaining at all with thier increased camber in terms of tire wear or handling on a street setup?or do i need to contact the dealer

 

where you live seems to have some bearing on what people are running. i started with -1.5 front, -1.0 rear, with 1/32" toe out in the front and 0 toe in the rear....but find -2.0 in the front, -1.5 rear (same toe settings as above) more better. a good search ("alignment") here and motoring underground will give you plenty of ideas/options. btw, bear in mind that the more negative camber, the greater the tire wear.

 

I daily drive my Cooper with -2.7 up front, -1.5 in the rear, zero toe front and slight toe in for the rear (~1/8" total toe in). As long as I rotate my tires at every oil change, they wear just fine. HOWEVER, this is a track/AX oriented alignment (mainly track, I've got another suggestion for AX). This requires constant attention on the street - especially on crowned and rutted roads.

For a good street setup that won't kill your tires (although you SHOULD still rotate them at every oil change, assuming you change your oil every 3-5K miles), I would suggest -1.75 up front, -1.2 in the rear, zero toe in front and slight toe in for the rear as a good baseline setting... That'll provide more lateral grip and more fun in the twisties without going overboard. P.S. You'll need a set of adjustable lower control arms to adjust the rear camber...

Start with the rear sway on soft and see how you like it... If you want the rear to rotate a bit more, put it on the firmer setting.

 

Thank you very much sir.Figures noted.You guys on these forums rock.

 

I would suggest somewhere in the range of -2 camber up front, stock-ish camber in rear (about -1.6, max), zero toe up front and a little toe-in in the rear.

Depending on how much driving you do in a straight line vs. twisties (ie. highway commuting vs fun time), -2.0 camber could give you even wear, or a little more wear on the inside... BUT it's not a deal breaker really.

The zero toe up front will allow the car to turn in better and won't affect tire wear, the toe-in in rear will keep it stable.

Currently I deviate from this advice with -2.3 camber up front (for autox, I see increased tire wear, I live with it, daily driver).

 

I dont think we got a straight road around here that's more that 2 miles if you're lucky,so mini is great also thats why i bought the cooper and supin the suspension,what are you going to do with a suprecharger and the weight.Anyways i was told by somewone in the know that 1.8 camber is stock for the rear? and i did not buy lower control arms so stock is what it's going to be for now anyways.I get conflicting # on the toe one says 0 toe up front and slight toe in in the rear,and the other says 0 toe in the rear and slight (toe in) in the front,quite the opposite? Everybody seems to be in the ballpark on the camber,so whatever the rear camber is at alighnment thats what i'll ask to have in front the plates are IE adj.Maybe somewone can now explain the effect of the toe setting on either end of the car.I have learnt lots from you guys.Thanks

 

you might want to ask some "real experts" about toe settings. i discussed camber and toe with danny at minicorsa, brian at wyvern mini, dan at grassroots, and eric at helix before i made my decision. it's interesting to see how different or similar the recommendations are...likewise, for the explainations for said settings. worse case scenario...if you don't like it, you can change up for about $75.00

 

Yea but i'd like to know what it does,if i dont like it sure i can change it,but how are you going to correct something you dont like if you dont know what effect the setting is doing to the car in the first place.So i would rather learn in the same manner as i now know what camber is doing.Good learning for all like me that dont know.I could just drive off and say Yea Baby Whoo Hoo

 

From what I've read, stock rear camber varies a lot from car to car. I've heard it's in the -1.3 to -1.8 range. Anything around there is fine. It's a fuzzy science.

 

Whatever i find the rear to be at with stock control arms i'll set the front to match for starters,but i'd love to know what the effects of toe are.

 

Toe in = more stable, less "darty", less likely to tramline on rutted roads, etc.
Toe out = less stable, "quicker" turn-in, can be a challenge to drive straight on rutted or crowned roads (pulls downhill...)
Zero toe = a good compromise for a street MINI IMHO and what I run...

 

Thats a good explanation makes sense to me.What effects would it have on the rear or better yet to have 0 toe all round

 

I run zero all around - I've been told by friends who have tried that a little toe in on the rear adds stability without any real penalty in responsiveness... but I haven't personally tried it.

 

Thanks very much for explaning to me the pros and cons.I see u got FSD's on as well.How do you like them.I am soon going to be sitting on Ie camber adj plates M7 strut tower plates Fsd's and a HSport 19 rear bar with Powerflex bushes,so i'm hoping this will put this car on the button as a street driver.Thanks mate

 

I like the FSD's a lot. You're going to have a very good street setup when you're done.

 

This is what I run:

-1.8 front camber
-1.5 rear camber
0 toe all around.

Give me another $125 and I'd probably reduce the rear camber to -1.3 and add about 1/32" rear toe in (total 1/16" rear toe).

One time, I knew the mechanic and he let me set the front camber and toe when the car was on the Hunter machine. I got to watch the camber and toe change based on the adjustments to the car. Honestly, one tenth of a degree of camber was about the width of three hairs on my adjustable camber plates. A couple tenths here and there is not really going to make a difference (hence the stock tolerance of +/- 0.1 degrees).

One thing I did notice about rear camber was that increased rear camber will reduce oversteer. Before I got adjustable arms, the rears were -2.5ish. The car did not want to rotate at all, it felt like the tires were stuck to the pavement. I'm at -1.5 now, and the car accelerates much smoother, but the rear end isn't anchored down anymore (which is great on the track).

 

I'm running pretty much exactly the same setup as Ben^.

I have fixed plates so there's a bit of difference in my left & right front camber, but it doesn't matter.

It pulled on crowned roads badly with my old tires (Kumho SPT) but doesn't do it at all with my current tires (Nitto Neo Gen).... would have never thought tires would have made such a difference, but it did... was going to get a re-alignment to fix it, but got tires changed and everything felt *perfect*...

 

fyi https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...&highlight=toe
a lot of the cali guys seem to use minicorsa (danny) as their suspension guru. i have not experienced "dartyness" or instability with 1/32" toe out in the front....but i do think i get nice "turn in." the wear doesn't seem bad given several autocrosses and track days....i have dunlop direzza star specs (which are perdy darn soft).

 

Blimey now everybodys coming out of the woodwork,end of the day it has been very informative for me and i have learnt alot from you guys again thanks these forums rock.My tuner/vendor is saying -1.8 front -1.8 rear 0 toe in front and slight toe in in the rear.Thats right in the ballpark.I had to pick brains to see if it's in agreement with you all wizards, and at the same time i'v learnt aload.I live on an island in the caribbean with nothing but twisties so i cant wait.The motor has a Pipercross and a Borla with a MTH tuner map,It's a cooper so no more money going there.Bridgestone Potensa G111 tread is the same as SO-3 pole position must be a marketing thing different reigon,been on them for a while 6 months and they are great,cant wait for the bits.The guy doing my work is the best in town,works on the top 3 cars in the reigon but they arent Mini's those cars are on another planet deffo not street legal.Thanks everybody

 

Glad you found some answers here!

Just curious - which island?

 

I live in Barbados,town is traffic but outside is Mini land.The guys run curcuit and rally cars here.Cheers mate you've got to be a brit with a username like that

 

OK - can anybody out there translate 1/16" toe to either degrees and minutes or decimal degrees?

 

- 0.17 degrees

And would someone PALEASE tell me why there are so many database errors when trying to log into NAM? I cannot continue to be a member if every time I try to log in I receive errors or it takes 10 mintues to get into forums.