I took my car in for an alignment today and was told that the rear camber is slightly too negative (left at -1.9, right at -2.0; 2004 coil suspension) so I'm in the same boat. grunner58, did you ever get your issue resolved or did you leave it alone???

 

Where did you have the alignment check performed? If anywhere other than a Lexus dealer, get it checked at a Lexus dealer.

Rear camber is not fully adjustable (as you may know). There are only 3 different length arms that can be installed. I would not start messing with rear camber if the car tracks true at highway speeds.

Here's the related thread to this one > https://www.clublexus.com/forums/ls-...ment-saga.html

 

Some background information: I've had my LS430 since the end of October and have noticed on occasion that the car likes to drift to the right. On some roads is doesn't occur and on others it does. The car does seem to track alright with the steering wheel pointed straight. Anyway, last Saturday I got an email from my local Firestone retailer offering a $30 discount on alignments to celebrate Cyber Monday so I booked an appointment for this morning.

I have used this store in the past with 3 different cars and they have always managed to do a reasonable job so I thought I'd give them first dibs on this one. They phoned me a little over a hour after I dropped of the car and told me that everything was in spec with the exception of the camber measurements on both of the rear sides. They were upfront with the knowledge that it would take a different length control arm in order to bring the car back to spec and that they recommended that I take it to a Lexus dealer for that. Here is the data sheet that they gave me:



So after doing some research on this site it didn't take me long to figure out that I would have to put in a shorter control arm if I wanted to make the camber less negative. At this time I think I'm just going to wait until I mount my new winter tires and see if that makes any difference in the way that the car tracks. At this point I suspect that it might be more tire related issue than an alignment issue. I don't recall seeing any severe inner edge wear on the existing tires but I'll have to give them a good look tomorrow also. My new winter tires are directional so I can't cross rotate them to keep the inner wear down if I end up not changing anything with the rear setup on my car.


Thanks for pointing out that thread. I wanted to see if the OP had actually gone ahead and replaced his control arm with the shorter one at the Lexus dealer and what his final measurements would have been if he had. I'm not trying to be critical but he actually had an order placed for a shorter control arm that would have resolved his problem but he changed it and ordered the same length arm after reading this post:

You did raise valid questions and that is the beauty of this discourse, we can all see what works and what doesn't. Unfortunately for grunner58 staying with the same length arm did not work out for him. I'd be interested in finding out what the repeatability and reproducibility spec's are for the alignment systems that these shops use, including the ones that Lexus dealers use. I was surprised to see the variability in some of the measurements performed on grunner58's car at that Goodyear store...

 

Wish we weren't such a lawyerly society, or.................
I would produce and sell my homemade adjustable lower control arms.
With help from a local machine shop, we modified my arms in a day, creating a pair that are easy to adjust, and make camber adjustment a piece of cake.
No way to tell why Lexus didn't make the arm adjustable; there's no sensible reason why not; and they acknowledge the issue by offering very expensive replacement arms in different lengths.

IIRC, aftermarket firms (FIGS ?) also make these arms, but pricier than Lexus.

 

Megan makes fully adjustable rear camber arms > http://www.meganracing.com/product.asp?prodid=1189&catid=25

FIGS was fabricating fully adjustable camber arms for CL members years ago.

 

I've got -1.9 camber on the right rear. Stays straight from 60 - high speed. Being just slightly out of spec doesn't seem to be significant. Good luck.