Wheel aligment after lift

[majti]

I have fitted 5'' lift and went to align my wheels. After the aligment the car still pulls to the left. Before the lift the car was going straight. I went for second time and the guy said its because of the tires (whick i doubt). What is it i have to check? I think i'm first here in my city to do such a lift and dont think some has encounterd the similiar situation. They didn't touch panhard rods. Do they need to check for thet too?

plz help

.majti

[JBE]

You say that your car still pulls to the left. Does that mean that you had this problem before the lift went in? I assume that you checked all the bushes in the panhard rod and the radius arms. What did the alignment shop actually do and did you get a printout of the readings? Maybe they only corrected toe in. I found out that my car had pos camber (+20') on the left and neg (-22') on the right front which made the car pull to the left. A lot of alignment shops don't know that camber can be corrected with offset kingpins for the Patrol. Is the camber on your front within specs. Your problem is not neccessarily the same as mine, but it sounds similar and I have the same setup GQ wagon with a 5" Megalift.

Cheers
Joachim

[JBE]

You say that your car still pulls to the left. Does that mean that you had this problem before the lift went in? I assume that you checked all the bushes in the panhard rod and the radius arms. What did the alignment shop actually do and did you get a printout of the readings? Maybe they only corrected toe in. I found out that my car had pos camber (+20') on the left and neg (-22') on the right front which made the car pull to the left. A lot of alignment shops don't know that camber can be corrected with offset kingpins for the Patrol. Is the camber on your front within specs. Your problem is not neccessarily the same as mine, but it sounds similar and I have the same setup GQ wagon with a 5" Megalift.

Cheers
Joachim

[toughnut]

Have you got adjustable panhard rods front and rear? If so you need to make sure the diffs are central. Have a look at your diffs, do they sit off to one side? Did you fit adjustable trailing arms. If you did you also need to set them up properly. Your patrol may be crabbing slightly sideways as it drives. Lifting a vehicle does put extra stress on steering components and with vehicles like patrols where the steering geometry is fairly precise it will easily be upset with any changes made to your suspension. You can set the panhards your self by taping some string to your guards with a small weight on the other end so it hangs straight down. Measure the distance between the outside edge of the tyre and the string on both sides. Adjust until the measurement is the same both sides. As for adjustable trailing arms, measure the distance between the front edge of the rear tyre and the front of the wheel arch on both sides and adjust until they are the same. This may fix the problem a little but you'll find that most lifted patrols will pull to the left. One more thing you can do if you have a return to centre steering damper with removable mounting brackets. Loosen one of the mounting brackets and turn the steering wheel slightly to the right and retighten. This will stop it from pulling left if nothing else works. Don't move it too far though as you will bottom out the damper just like a shock without bump stops adjusted properly.