I had my car set up with Eibach Pro (1" drop front, 1.5" drop rear) and Bilstein shocks a couple months back...didn't have the cash for camber plates but according to American Muscle, the Eibach camber bolts would allow proper camber adjustment after the drop. Sure enough, the alignment shop wasn't able to align the camber correctly until we put those in and now I have -1.5* in the front...

Word on the street is that these camber bolts are a potential failure point and that they're known to sheer and fail catastrophically.

Is this true? How could Eibach put their name on a product that is so dangerous?

 

You can get those camber bolts in a parts supply house as well. The S197 has no adjustment point for camber. So I would imagine that cars need them after an accident or as they get old and things don't line up any more. They definitely are not as beefy as the originals, and cannot be as strong. But plenty of people run them and I would not be overly concerned with them. If you are really worried, I would purchase a set of camber plates.

 

If you are tracking, yes, they're more prone to fail, because tracking. Get CC plates.

If you are driving normally, less of a worry.

True, the camber bolts are smaller diameter than the original stock, and only have the cam on ONE side of the bolt (the head), and what they do is spin about in the hole, and push the strut and spindle holes around with that cam.

The cam area, though, is quite beefy there, and isn't going to shear off without a *serious* trauma to that bolt... and the lower bolt is a more likely failure mode location than the top one. Although I'll grant that angles of geometry and what not make it possible to have the strut/spindle act like a pair of scissors and try to kill that thing... but they shoudn't be moving in the first place if done properly. The stuff is held in tension when properly done.

Someone didn't do their torquing.

Thousands of cam bolts out there. Millions maybe. And of course, the loudest are those who speak of "They suck and failed on me!" But the majority don't have issues, or they'd be getting sued and stop selling them.

The doom you hear about are from those who are doing something wrong... like off roading or improperly installing them... or maybe, just maybe, got a bad one. It does happen, nothing manufactured is ever perfect... it's why new Mustangs have warranties, after all, right?

You'll be fine.

 

I just looked around on the net and the Ford approved bolts are actually larger then the aftermarket ones. They require drilling out the hole in the strut to accommodate the larger size. If you are worried about it, get a hold of those and install them. They can be torqued down to original specs and don't compromise strength.

 

The concern is that the instructions for the smaller cam bolts call for much less torque (77 lb-ft) that the OEM bolts (166 lb-ft). There have been incidents of cracking the spindle, and the one of the changes was to go to a fine thread pitch on the strut bolts and raise the torque spec.

Based on the photos I've seen the Ford bolt kit (4R3Z-3B236-AB) might be more accurately described as cam washer (bolt diameter is the same as original). The Ford kit requires slotting the lower strut hole (procedure in the shop manual). I would guess the offset of the washer locates the adjustment within the well in the stamping of the OEM type strut ears.

I don't think the Ford bolt kit will be effective with the aftermarket (non-GT500) Bilstein struts. The aftermarket Bilstein struts ears appear to be flat steel pieces welded to the strut body (unlike the stamped OEM type which wrap around). Without this recess (or well) the cam really can't locate the camber adjustment.

 

GT500 Mounts will do the job, just point the arrows inwards and you will be fine.

 

Many people that I know and trust swear by the gt500 mounts. One note is that you'd need pre2011 struts to work with them. If the op has already purchased shocks, it would be cheaper to by cc plates than repurchase shocks again that work with the gt500 mounts.

 

I've read the same thing. Thats why i pointed the arrows toward the engine on my GT500 strut mounts when i lowered my v6. I don't know if my front end is off or not but, it feels the same as it did before i lowered it. Tracks straight and true. I'll keep an eye on my front tires but other than that, i'm not going to worry about it

 

Per advice on the forum, I did this and it still didn't provide enough camber.

What specs are you guys running?

 

I used the Steeda plates and couldn't be happier with them. Quality parts, easy install and the shop that did the alignment for me said they were easy to adjust. As for the cost...yup, they were expensive but I don't believe suspension is a place to pinch pennies. Others may have a different opinion on safety.

Since I run 275's on the front and 315's on the back and can't rotate, I opted to set mine as close to zero for longest tire life since I don't track the car or drive super hard on the street real often. If that changes I can mark my zero and set for track with the digital protractor. I believe stock spec is around -0.8 to -1.1. You can look that up on-line real easy. For hard tracking it can go up to -3.5 depending on the track and cars set up.

John

 

I recently had my '14 GT's factory alignment checked, partly out of curiosity and also because I like to do an occasional autocross. The factory camber spec according to the Hunter alignment computer is .07 negative. Mine came in at .08 on the passenger side and .09 on the driver's side. We set the the drivers side to .08 so both sides would be even and closer to stock specs while still keeping a good performance setting. The shop was able to do this by simply loosening the strut bolts and applying pressure to the struts and retightening the bolts. There is just enough play or slop to do this. Also the four bolt holes in the strut tower for the strut mounts are slightly larger than the strut mount studs so you can probably get a little movement here as well. It was common practice on the older SN95's to elongate the strut mount holes in the tower to get the alignment in spec, I suppose it could be done on the 197's as well. I have a Boss strut tower brace and the holes in the driver's side are round, but the holes on the passenger side are slotted so it appears that the factory anticipated the use of either camber plates or slotting of the strut tower holes for alignment purposes. One last point while camber/castor plates are a good idea [ at least IMO ] for track driven cars, if you simply change the camber settings from a street setting to a competition one you will also have to check and reset the toe since it will be affected by the change in camber. This isn't terribly difficult to do, but it does need to be done as well.

 

Whew, I feel better. I just had camber bolts put in by my dealer as did the struts and springs. I was a bit worried for a moment. I don't plan on drifting the car but would like to do some low level laps occasionally. Thanks!