Hi all. My bus has been lowered by around two I inches - think. I had the front beam replaced last year and a local specialist set up the suspension properly which made a big difference. My attention is now on the rear end (isn't it always ) as my rear tyres are wearing unevenly. I am on standard spring plates with trimmed down bump stops. Now I don't know full how it all works, or can understand the calculations, but are spring plates with a two inch drop the answer? Thanks
If you only want a 2 inch drop you don't need to have adjustable spring plates just a 1 spline turn on your existing spring plates will have the same result although taking the rear wheel off can sometimes be a problem
It may be more. I want to emulate what I already have. Does anyone know the standard height measurements from the ground to wheel arches? It was done be the previous owner.
The camber is more or less set in stone by the diagonal arm not the spring plate. To set at minimum camber when lowered you need to lift the shock end of the hub (relative to the spring plate end) with a jack before clamping it to the SP with the 4 22mm head bolts. That's the best you can get. The ones you see with huge camber the lowering person has let it dangle on the SP under it's own weight which produces max camber.
All I did on ours was use one of these .https://www.googleadservices.com/pa...jKgdDY0sTpAhU4UBUIHZejAfEQ9aACegQIDBBN&adurl= check angles for a start ours was different each side !. Google factory settings and adjust. Fit new donut bushes and talc.....
@SkutterBob The jack is to gently lift and support within the adjustment the fixings allow relative to the springplate, not ram it upwards against the springplate pressure which could damage the threads as you tighten. I should have been more clear.
Is it scrubbing the inside edge out? Lowering puts the wheel further back, *****ing the toe up. Take it to a place that has 4 wheel alignment, and get them to set the rear toe. If there is not enough adjustment, you might need lowering plates that have longer slots. Probably.
In the end, though, to get the wheel camber back to where they were before lowering you need to either fit shims or go back up to stock. Its all designed so the camber increases correctly for a stock bus rolling out on a corner. So the top of the bus is over at a few degrees and the tyre is flat. Lowering fools the suspension geometry into behaving like you are hammering round a corner in both directions all the time. The other approach which I am trying is using tyres with a 50psi max rating running at 45psi at the back in an effort to reduce some of the load on the edge of the tyres. If you do too well at removing camber the tyre will touch the wheel arch and/or be impossible to get off.
@SkutterBob , are you able to jack up the rear and remove the wheels easily. My van was lowered when I bought it and the rear wheels are splayed out and so the tyres wear unevenly. A few months back I needed to take the wheels off and had to use a scissor jack, not easy, to force the spring plates down to the bottom stop and then remove the wheels. The spring plates are bolted to the torsion bar which is splined at each end and hidden inside the axle tube. Using the scissor jack forced the spring plate down against the torsion bar twisting effect, it takes a great deal of force to achieve it and I did have concerns about the safety aspect of this procedure and the strength of the jack. My plan is to get my van back to stock height, which is maybe what you will be advised to do on here.
I'm not really getting accepting excessive tyre wear as unavoidable. Only one spline down but I drove my Westy for 7-8 years and never had to replace the tyres. I didn't see any uneven wear. I can't find a very good picture. Early much lower. Flipped spindles approx 4 1/2 inches, rear to suit. Not too bad? Again no noticeable tyre wear but I only had it lowered for a year or so. I realise my photos aren't great but before I made the effort to adjust to min camber it looked like this. Not max, but somewhere in the middle of the possibilities.
Yes I can, so I don't think it is lowered too much. I will try and get pictures. When at Techenders a few years ago @Lasty and me replaced the rear donuts but couldn't do the offside inner one because we couldn't get the bolts off. I still haven't got round to doing it so this maybe part of the issue?
You are not alone. New tyres in February as outer tread still basically new, inner edge down to cord.
