Factory alignment

[Julian Thompson]

I’ve read that a few 110’s are miles off their alignment from the factory. I’ve not checked mine yet, but I’ve got it up on the ramp at the moment for a nosey round and I’ve discovered this:


And on the other side this:



Obviously you can interpret those two marks any way you like, but my take on it is that the alignment of the car was set and then those white marks were scored on each side.

Then, I opine that the car went for final tightening and a final check of the final tightening. I believe that is what the red and yellow marks are on the nuts on the other side:



And



So, I reckon my car slipped its alignment during final tightening. Obviously I don’t know yet, but I thought it was interesting enough to post. - Edit to add - car is brand new and unused as I trailered it from dealer and haven’t driven it yet so there is no way it’s slipped during use.

Edited by Julian Thompson on Sunday 10th December 18:05

[bcr5784]

Some of us have found that the car (at least after a few miles of "settling") have been some way off factory settings. If you have any concerns about stability (in particular) I would get the car checked by someone reputable. If the car is to spec I'd think about going to Life 110 settings - which most seem to prefer. That said I've personally have no issue with the standard settings - and as a result I've never "got around" to changing the \life 110 settings - though I keep promising myself I really ought to give them a try.

[Julian Thompson]

Yes it’ll be interesting in the spring when I get it on the road - I will check the settings on it before I run it now I’ve noticed that.

I took the undertrays off whilst I was there for a bit of a look. The car is unbelievably thoughtfully constructed, an absolute modern miracle to be honest. Anyone that knows anything about making anything would be very impressed indeed. Superb.

Couple of underbody shots with and without panels:

[Whaleblue]

If you haven’t yet, I’d recommend you get a copy of David Twohig’s Inside The Machine

Inside the machine - An engineer’s tale of the modern automotive industry https://amzn.eu/d/gP4LYpF

and maybe even Bernard Ollivier‘s

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61073320-alpin...

but only if you, or are prepared to try to, read French. I’m in the latter category and looking forward to the challenge.

Edited by Whaleblue on Monday 11th December 08:05

[Simon Owen]

Julian Thompson said:

I’ve read that a few 110’s are miles off their alignment from the factory. I’ve not checked mine yet, but I’ve got it up on the ramp at the moment for a nosey round and I’ve discovered this:


So, I reckon my car slipped its alignment during final tightening. Obviously I don’t know yet, but I thought it was interesting enough to post. - Edit to add - car is brand new and unused as I trailered it from dealer and haven’t driven it yet so there is no way it’s slipped during use.

Edited by Julian Thompson on Sunday 10th December 18:05

I admire your patience Julian !! Below are the settings applied to our car, note not fully adjustable ride height in our instance.

[Julian Thompson]

That’s mega, thanks Simon!

[justcars]

Hi, just having a look at my underside photos for comparison. There is a bit of shift on one side, but I don’t have the opportunity to take more angles to clarify at the moment. Probably most important to my untrained eye is that all 4 bolt heads in the adjustment cams are in the same relative position.
What I did find were well aligned witness marks across components, and multi-colour coded, demonstrating multiple checks during assembly.
The wishbone labels show just one corner recorded a comparable spike in ‘Fitting Load’, but no reference to setting or adjustment.
Thanks for the pointer, I shall have to look more closely when I next have the wheels off.

[Terminator X]

Mine was well out from the factory. Chap at Spires asked if it was a "hamdful" when he checked it!

TX.

[Simon Owen]

Just to clarify the 'before' measurements in the table above were not factory, I had already attempted to improve them closer to Life 110's recommendations.