Alignment

I replaced a rear bearing and in the process removed the lower suspension links to the hub. Being a dummy, I did not mark the eccentric bolts orientation and when I reinstalled the links the eccentrics ended up in a random orientation. I took the car to the local tire shop for an alignment. They showed me how wonky the left rear was and that the front right went to its limit and still wasn't quite in spec. Is anyone else unable to to get into full alignment?

Quotes source post: 11670487

Can you determine the position of the bolts/fasteners from the markings left by the bolts/fasteners? As long as you put everything back together again correctly the shop should have been able to align the car. I suspect it is not up to speed on Porsche alignment. These cars are tricky to align. Make an adjustment and the setting this controls becomes ok, but another setting goes out. Move to the other adjuster and in turning this while this setting becomes ok the 1st setting changes again. As a result the tech has to go back and forth to the various adjusters to bring all settings into their proper adjustment in some kind of a Porsche alignment ballet. Porsche techs know this routine well. Indy shops, especially shops that don't specialize in Porsches, don't know this routine.

The eccentrics on the bolts have a round OD so there are no telltale marks to return to the original position. The alignment was performed by the local tire chain across the street from where I work. I bought 4 Michelin Super Sports (made a huge difference) from them a few weeks ago and they are so convenient. They have a laser system and the printout shows that the right front is .2 degrees out of factory setting. That isn't much and now my steering wheel points straight on the highway. A trip to the P-car indy with my alignment results is in the cards. If anyone cares, the bolt heads for my eccentrics faced aft, making them easily accessible with a socket wrench (after the sway bar was dropped). The nuts are accessed through cutouts in the frame and require an open end wrench and that wrench can only be turned about 1/8th of a rotation before hitting the frame. I should have had a box wrench on the bolt heads to prevent rotation while turning the nuts for what seemed like 15 minutes. This was true for both eccentrics. I considered reinstalling the bolts pointed in the opposite direction but did not. I should have punched my wheel bearing replacement card on a front bearing first. I'm pretty sure I could swap out both fronts, detail the car and read war and peace in less time than the one rear bearing took.

Well, if you want to try this if you can get the car in the air with the other side probably ok you can take measurements of the other side using a large square and using a tape measure to measure distances of the various links on the "good" side and try to adjust the side you worked on to bring the same dimensions into as close agreement as you can. I have done an "alignment" this way once or twice -- not for a Porsche though -- and got the thing pretty close. I still think you would have to have an alignment done and my recommendation would be to have this done at a Porsche dealer service department or a highly regarded indy shop that does Porsches. A lot of Porsches. Before you take the car in though be sure you fill up the gas tank. Remove any junk (dead weight) from the car and install the tool kit and spare tire where they belong before bringing the car in for an alignment. Be sure you specify you want the steering wheel centered. And you want a *before* and *after* printout of the alignment settings.