08 GT. Adding Votgland lowering springs and Koni Str.t's all 4 corners. 1.2" drop. Must I get an alignment?

 

Yes, I would highy recommend it. Mine was way out after spring installation. Did you put a adjustable panhard bar in?

 

Yes I did. What year is yours? "Way out" as a problem to drive?

 

Yes, almost certainly it's out of spec.

 

You may not need it immediately. The problem when I lowered mine was the settling time. The new springs are going to take some time to settle to their final ride height. For example, when first put on, the lowering might be .9 inches. But as you drive a bit and use them, they will settle to the final 1.2 inches.

I dropped mine about 1.25 inches all around and for a while the alignment was fine. Once they settled though, I had some major problems. Camber was horribly negative (wore the inside of my tires out completely) and toe was out of whack.

I suggest drive them without for a few weeks then get an alignment. You will more thank likely need one eventually, however.

 

Dont drive it for a week with the toe that far out of alignment from the drop.
Unless you have sacrifical tires on there. Besides it is not safe at highway speeds
to have your toe that far out of whack. Everything else (caster/camber) is nonadjustable
OEM without caster /camber plates. And you might want to consider a bump
steer kit as well and get it installed when the toe is corrected.
Dont let any alignment shop fool you. Nothing is adjustable on the front end
without slotting mounting holes with a round file (WTF) except for the toe
without caster/camber plates.

The only thing your rear needs is a panhard bar adjustment to get the
rear end recentered like it was before the spring install.
Take the rear wheel well to tire measurements you took before the spring
install and use that data to recenter the rear end at ride height.

 

Just the fact that you're disassembling the front suspension means that you should at least check it. Just because parts are interchangeable does not make them precisely identical, nor does it guarantee that the reassembly would perfectly match the original production line build even if you were NOT lowering the car.

What you really want to do is set the alignment to about where you want it right away, with the conscious intention of re-checking and resetting it later. Perhaps set camber that's just a little less negative than what you eventually want, with the idea that as the springs settle and the car drops a little more the camber will 'drift' toward where you want it.

FWIW, if you can read a digital angle finder and bought camber plates (or caster-camber plates or something like the Steeda HD strut mounts) like you probably should have done, you can at least rough-set the camber adjustments yourself. Seriously.


Norm

 

Well, struts, springs, shocks and adjustable panhard rod are in all around. Drop looks good. The car still has a slight raked look to it, but much less then prior to the install. The rear is all centered again. As far as the alignment, is the car suppose to track better now than before? Because it does. I do 120 miles a day on the turnpike and it tracks like an arrow. Eats up imperfections in the roadway. Was getting thrown around before. And I'm very pleased with the ride of the Koni's and Votgland springs. Right in the middle of to harsh and to soft. Very pleased with the way it turned out. Did take pics of the inside edge of the front tires and will monitor any wear.

 

Well, with stiffer springs and better shocks/struts it isn't going to be moving around on its suspension as much as it was before.

It's not really possible to comment on how much of the new observations come from alignment, other than perhaps there wasn't much change in either the cross-camber (side to side camber difference) or toe from where they were before.

At ~120 highway miles/day, most of your driving does not call for a whole lot of negative camber.


Norm