Front tyre clearance

[Simon]

Hi guys, just want to ask if any of you are fitting 215/60/15s and are having or had clearance problems when turning the wheels ?

Simon.

[Fran Hall RCR]

You will have no issues at all with that size tyre package, if it does touch the body then you still have some basic body alignment to do.
Make sure you have the lower control arm in the forward most position first as noted in the manual...

[MReid]

Mine rubbed slightly at full lock, but once I moved the rocker panels all the way back and moved all the lower control arm shims to the back, there was plenty of clearance.

[Simon]

Fran,
I've set the shims almost as per the manual - the only deviation being that on the rear heim i have moved one shim from rear to front. I did this to get a caster of 5 deg - would this make such a difference ?
As for the rocker, the RH side is as far back as possible, part of the front lip has been removed to give extra adjustment.
I removed the spring from the shock and set my ride height to 4.5 inches. Am i missing something else ?
I'm in work at the momnent but will post a pic if this helps. What sort of gap would you expect between tyre and rocker/front clip at it's smallest point ?

[Simon]

Here are some pics that might highlight where i'm going wrong.

[EGLITOM]

SIMON

There are probably several reasons in my humble opinion

1. try to move the lower arm in the most forward position ( one shim less in the front)and also move the upper control arm one shim less to a more forward position to keep your caster adjustment . You still should have one ore two shims left than to do fine adjustments later
2. check if your heim joints on the lower control arm are screwed in or out equaly. If you would have your front heim more out than the rear, it would move the wheel towards the rear.or if unequaly the rearward one should be outer more than the front one, but best is to keep them equaly in ( they are probably a good way out anyway and you don´t want them out any further as necessarry by making the m unequaly out)) Same account for heim joints on upper arm.
3. Thats about all you can do on the suspension without compromising the basic setup
4. I know you have a KUMHO tire. Is it the SOLUS type? If so, i checked the total diameter of it, and as mentioned in our phonecall yesterday, it is one of the 215´s with the biggest total diameters. It is 640 mm in dia ( at least from the datas i found on the net). compared to that the AVON CR6 ZZ has an dia of 635 mm. Ok thats only 2,5 mm in radius but on top the AVOn has a different section design. Its tread width is just 185mm, meaning the shoulder turns in probably in a steeper angle than on your Kumho, giving so enough clearance. I.e my Pirelli 225/50/15 which i have on since yesterday has only a dia of 608 mm, but due to the tread width of 220 mm, by turning in, the clearance left over to the rocker panel is also only about 10mm. So definitely it is not just the nominal tire size, it is more over the real dimensions of it and the the real sectional design which gives you enough clearance or not. I realy would think more about changing the tire to the AVON which is what you are planning anyway.
5. Onby updated tirelist with the KUMHO SOLUS in it
6. everything else looks ok to me on your body alignement (wouldn´t move farer back)

Did send some pics to your email as promised

hope i could help

TOM

[Simon]

Thanks Tom, i know we spoke about this last night, but i was still unhappy that i could not get these tyres to clear even though i'm planning on changing to Avons. They are SOLUSs by the way. I will try your recommendations this weekend.

Thanks again,
Simon.