SRT Front Brake Swap Info

[hansken_yo]

I don't know if you all remember the Camber problems that I had with installing the front SRT hubs/brakes. Well, when i was doing my engine swap I put both the SXT hub (left) and the SRT hub (right) next to each other to see if there were any visible differences.


Well, if you look closely enough the angel of the arm that connects to the struts are ever so slightly different. The chances of them being bent (and at the same degree nonetheless) are slim to none, as there are no stress marking either to suggest anything being damaged. This difference was enough to put my alignment out by 3.5degrees positive camber. After some research and help I came across the following article, which was very informative:

We knew before installing the struts that aggressive camber would be required to make the SRT-4 handle like a real sports car. In stock form, the SRT-4 has 0* front camber and no provision for adjustment. The Mopar coil-overs try to solve this problem with a slotted hole on the strut mounting ears. In theory, this allows you to tilt the hub/brake/wheel assembly inward when you assemble the suspension, giving you instant, free camber. In practice, though, it's nearly impossible to get exactly the camber you want with this system. Manually pushing the wheel to exactly the position you want, to 0.1* precision, and simultaneously tightening this impossible to reach bolt, all without blocking the alignment rack's lasers... well, that's what we call difficult.

To make matters worse, tilting the hub relative to the strut puts the top of the tire closer to the strut, which limits how wide a tire you can use. With our 225/45ZR-17s, we wouldn't have room for any meaningful camber.

http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/proje ... index.html

One fix to the problem, which the article suggests (not quoted) is Ground Control Suspension Systems, though this is quite expensive.
http://www.ground-control-store.com/pro ... =145/CA=97


The other suggestion, and the one I'm going to attempt in the near future is to slot the holes in the struts ears that connect to the hub. On my particular struts (KYB) I'm not sure there is enough room on the top bolt hole, so we might slot the lower hole. The plan after this is to get the car aligned and then spot weld the nut of the slotted hole in place so it is less likely to come out of alignment.

Pic of the slotted mopar coilovers: http://www.modernperformance.com/dcx/mopar_kw2.jpg

This is just my plan so when i get around to actually doing this (need money to get another alignment) I'll do a how-to with pics a specifications.

Comments or concerns are definitely welcome just in case I overlooked something.

[Diablo0]

Yeah, slotting the holes has been a known practice for some time now in order to get some camber adjustment out of stock struts. I wouldn't weld the nut though, if they're torqued enough they should't budge.

Have you tried going with camber bolts on the top and bottom bolts?

The knuckles do seem to bend without any stress marks though. When I did my swap I wasn't really paying much attention to the front passenger knuckle and after I put it on and tried to get the strut to bolt up it wouldn't... keep trying to get it and still woudln't do anything. Then I looked at it and right there in front of me... the area where the strut bolts up was bent... no stress marks or anything so I never noticed it without really looking at it dead on...

[hansken_yo]

I'd still say that I'm new to the modification world so I just recently came across the slotting information. As for the hubs being bent, well... that was questionable, but both produce the same camber offset, basically the hubs are identical with one another.

I looked into using camber bolts on top and bottom and first of they wouldn't go far enough for me to get MY desired camber of -1deg to -1.5deg. Additionally, talking with techs about going that route pretty much told me that it isn't stable. Any good bump will most likely and easily throw out the camber, compared to standard setups. The slotting route should provide the stability while allowing for greater camber adjustment.