Rough alignment at home

[Marc_986]

Most of my car has been apart for a suspension overhaul. To make it to the alignment specialist I need to set it roughly correct. Just safe enough to get there.

On the front the tie-rods didn't come off, so seeing that the camber is set at the top (rather than the bottom as in the rear) by the strut I don't expect it to be off by much. Will check camber but the total adjustment range is very limited anyway.

On the rear I do need to set toe. I have a flat piece of plywood with some small blocks attached. The blocks hit the rim to have the plywood clear the center of the wheel. My plan is to use my laser distance meter to point along the plywood in forward direction. So the plywood sits horizontal on the rear wheel, laser points towards the front of the car.

Now the rear of the car is about 10cm (4") wider than the front, so I intend to point 5cm / 2" next to the center of the front wheel (accounting for thickness of plywood and blocks). That should give me about zero toe. Any thoughts?

For camber I'll take a piece of plywood, create a foot and put it at a right angle to the ground. I'll need to cut out a little bottom corner to clear the tyre, making it contact the rim. Then I can measure the distance from plywood to top of the rim and calculate the angle. I tried my mobile phone along the wheel vertically (including the earlier mentioned plywood strip with blocks), but measurements are not consistent across direction of the phone (left or right) or between phones.