Hello, I just lowered my girlfriend's car on H&R RSS coilovers with front IE camber plates and I have about a 1 finger wheel gap all around. The car has settled for a week, and I want to know if the car can get alligned back to normal without having to buy additional parts like rear camber link/control arms.
Please let me know if we can go ahead and get the alignment or if we have to buy additional parts. Thanks.

2002 MCS R53 that belongs to my girlfriend, (after driving hers, i wished i had one)
She is not going to track her car. So the alignment will be close to normal factory settings.
she has fixed IE camber plates cause the OEMs were ripped and was a little cheaper to buy IE.

 

first you should say exactly what car you have. That is always good info to have. How bad is your rear camber? If you only have a finger of gap then I would think the rears are way off as far as camber goes in the rear. I'm pretty sure '05 up R53, R52 have a little adjustment in the rear factory lower control arms. Its only a little though and if you have a significant amount of rear camber (from lowering the car alot) you won't be able to bring it back to factory specs without buying control arms. When I lowered my '05 with the BC's my rear camber was insanely negative after lowering and definitely needed control arms. Hope this helps ya out a little,

Steve

 

whoops, it is a 2002 MCS, R53. The rear camber does look really bad.
Are there any good shops in los angeles/orange county that will align lowered cars? I'm afraid her car went be able to get on the lifts. :( You guys have low cars to begin with.

 

Since your 2003 MCS does not have any adjustment for rear camber, you will probably want adjustable lower control arms to reduce the amount of negative camber in the rear. Otherwise you will wear the inside edge of the rear tires. You should install the control arms before an alignment.

Since you stated IE Camber Plates I assume they are the adjustable plates and not the fixed IE camber bushing. If adjustable you will need to decide what alignment settings you want because you probably do not want the OEM alignment specs that the alignment shop will automatically use. You might want specific camber and toe settings. Caster is not adjustable. Also the rear toe is a pain to adjust so make sure the shop will adjust the rear toe.

You are right to be concerned about driving the car onto the lift. It will probably rub at the front bumper/spoiler. Some shops have boards to use in front of the ramp for lowered cars. Talk to the shop about the lowering and clearance on thier ramp. Another concern is that the alignment guy my not even think when driving the car up the ramp and will just let it rub on the way up.

 

thanks quik, she will be riding factory settings with her fixed IE plates. I may buy the alta performance lower control arms because they have a sale for fathers day. Do you guys suggest any other control arms?

 

With the fixed plates you should be at about -1.5 to -1.8 in the front. I suspect your rear camber is around -3. You might want to think about different toe settings in the front (less toe-in). I found that the toe-in with negative camber tends to wear the tires a little quicker, especially if not driving hard. I found no ill affects by going with slight toe-out in the front.

I liked the Hotchkis (H-Sport) control arms that I used on my 2003 MCS but they are more expensive.