Home » Public Forums » GMCnet » [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made at GMCWS Casa de Fruita rally
| [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made at GMCWS Casa de Fruita rally [message #167937] |
Sun, 29 April 2012 10:47  |
glwgmc
Messages: 1014
Registered: June 2004
Karma: 10
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Senior Member |
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Thanks Steve and Armand. I am glad you and so many others who have commented in person or off line found the information useful.
As important as it is for us to now make the corrections for the difference between biased ply and radial ply tire behavior that GM did not make, the 1000 pound gorilla in the room remains ride height. Not relative ride height, but absolute ride height. If that is not set correctly nothing else can be set correctly. With more than 90% of the coaches coming to this rally having incorrectly set ride height one can easily conclude that many if not most of the GMCs on the road have the ride height set incorrectly.
If you are still fighting a coach that wants to dart back and forth, or follow road ruts, or gets blown around in the wind, or exhibits a feeling of "torque steer", or if it feels like the front bumper is going to dig into the pavement on hard braking, start by setting the correct factory ride height. You may be amazed by how much better you coach drives with just this change.
If you are one who likes the way your coach drives now, you may really love the way your coach drives when you get the ride height where it should be.
Checking ride height only takes a few minutes right at home. Setting ride height is not difficult, but it is time consuming and does require the use of the special torsion bar unloading tool. It is time consuming because you have to jack up your coach to set the front ride height and any time you jack it up you have to drive it for a few miles before the suspension will settle into where it will be while you are normally going down the road. No amount of jostling or jumping on the bumper will properly settle it. And, it is an iterative process. Check, set, drive, recheck, set again, drive again, etc. until it is bang on rear and front after a few mile drive.
Once the ride height is correct, it is easy, fast and safe to check the alignment right on your own parking pad. Just follow the instructions you can download off of my web site http://jerrywork.com or the GMCWS web site.
If your coach still does not drive right, then almost certainly you have worn out bushings on the control arms, and/or worn out ball joints, and/or worn out tie rod ends, and/or your steering box is not centered when your wheels are parallel with the frame. If any of those are bad, then no amount of adjustment of anything will help. One unintended advantage of installing the one ton front end is it forces you to replace the bushings and ball joints and check the tie rod ends and centering of the steering box. There are all the other intended advantages that have been well articulated as well.
The bottom line for me is, why some very large percentage of our GMC owners (as many as 90% based on this sample) are willing to put up with an ill handling coach, or one that could handle much, much better?
Jerry
Jerry Work
The Dovetail Joint
Fine furniture designed and hand crafted in the 1907 former Masonic Temple building in historic Kerby, OR
Visitors always welcome!
glwork@mac.com
http://jerrywork.com
541-592-5360
www.southernoregonguild.org
www.siskiyouguild.org
-------------------------------
Message: 11
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2012 06:11:19 -0700
From: Steven Ferguson <botiemad11@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made
at GMCWS Casa de Fruita rally
To: gmclist@temp.gmcnet.org
Message-ID:
<CAKe9xFQD5bhphHu1Z48Wrz1zd7u9C2xfg1r8WUkF+fjYyNnsaA@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Just plain EXCELLENT Jerry.
On Sat, Apr 28, 2012 at 10:41 AM, Sharon Work <sharonwork@mac.com> wrote:
> Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made at GMCWS Casa de Fruita
> rally
Jerry Work
The Dovetail Joint
Fine furniture designed and hand crafted in the 1907 former Masonic Temple building in historic Kerby, OR
Visitors always welcome!
glwork@mac.com
http://jerrywork.com
541-592-5360
www.southernoregonguild.org
www.siskiyouguild.org
_______________________________________________
GMCnet mailing list
Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
Jerry & Sharon Work
78 Royale
Kerby, OR
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| Re: [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made at GMCWS Casa de Fruita rally [message #167971 is a reply to message #167937] |
Sun, 29 April 2012 18:05  |
 |
USAussie
Messages: 15912
Registered: July 2007
Location: Sydney, Australia
Karma: 6
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Senior Member |
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Gerry,
I agree your alignment presentation was 1st class!
I would suggest one thing before people set their ride height. Weigh the
coach and then distribute the weight so that the max differential from side
to side is 250 pounds or less. That number is somewhere in some manual, IIRC
Chuck Boyd found it but for the life of me I can't remember where!
Last year Helen and I were at a RV park in San Antonio. We went to bed early
and when we got up the next morning there was a GMC parked next to us! Turns
out it was a couple from Canada and their coach was completely redone. It
was gorgeous! I got to talking to the husband and he noted that while it
looked good it handled TERRIBLY! It was all over the road. Naturally I
pointed him in Dave Lenzi's direction. At the Shawnee convention I asked
Dave if he had ever contacted him and he advised yes he had. Dave helped him
re-do the entire front end with his parts and when he was done the owner
told him it was much better but it still wandered. This surprised Dave and
he instructed the owner to have the coach weighed which he did. Turns out
that one side was heavier than the other by 750 pounds! The company that
built the coach put all the "stuff" down one side of the coach creating that
huge imbalance. Dave told the owner the only way he would get it to handle
was to redistribute the weight.
Regards,
Rob M.
USAussie - Downunder
AUS '75 Avion - The Blue Streak TZE365V100428
USA '75 Avion - Double Trouble TZE365V100426
-----Original Message-----
From: gmclist-bounces@temp.gmcnet.org
[mailto:gmclist-bounces@temp.gmcnet.org] On Behalf Of Work Jerry
Sent: Monday, April 30, 2012 1:47 AM
To: gmclist@temp.gmcnet.org
Subject: [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made at GMCWS
Casa de Fruita rally
Thanks Steve and Armand. I am glad you and so many others who have
commented in person or off line found the information useful.
As important as it is for us to now make the corrections for the difference
between biased ply and radial ply tire behavior that GM did not make, the
1000 pound gorilla in the room remains ride height. Not relative ride
height, but absolute ride height. If that is not set correctly nothing else
can be set correctly. With more than 90% of the coaches coming to this
rally having incorrectly set ride height one can easily conclude that many
if not most of the GMCs on the road have the ride height set incorrectly.
If you are still fighting a coach that wants to dart back and forth, or
follow road ruts, or gets blown around in the wind, or exhibits a feeling of
"torque steer", or if it feels like the front bumper is going to dig into
the pavement on hard braking, start by setting the correct factory ride
height. You may be amazed by how much better you coach drives with just
this change.
If you are one who likes the way your coach drives now, you may really love
the way your coach drives when you get the ride height where it should be.
Checking ride height only takes a few minutes right at home. Setting ride
height is not difficult, but it is time consuming and does require the use
of the special torsion bar unloading tool. It is time consuming because you
have to jack up your coach to set the front ride height and any time you
jack it up you have to drive it for a few miles before the suspension will
settle into where it will be while you are normally going down the road. No
amount of jostling or jumping on the bumper will properly settle it. And,
it is an iterative process. Check, set, drive, recheck, set again, drive
again, etc. until it is bang on rear and front after a few mile drive.
Once the ride height is correct, it is easy, fast and safe to check the
alignment right on your own parking pad. Just follow the instructions you
can download off of my web site http://jerrywork.com or the GMCWS web site.
If your coach still does not drive right, then almost certainly you have
worn out bushings on the control arms, and/or worn out ball joints, and/or
worn out tie rod ends, and/or your steering box is not centered when your
wheels are parallel with the frame. If any of those are bad, then no amount
of adjustment of anything will help. One unintended advantage of installing
the one ton front end is it forces you to replace the bushings and ball
joints and check the tie rod ends and centering of the steering box. There
are all the other intended advantages that have been well articulated as
well.
The bottom line for me is, why some very large percentage of our GMC owners
(as many as 90% based on this sample) are willing to put up with an ill
handling coach, or one that could handle much, much better?
Jerry
Jerry Work
The Dovetail Joint
Fine furniture designed and hand crafted in the 1907 former Masonic Temple
building in historic Kerby, OR
Visitors always welcome!
glwork@mac.com
http://jerrywork.com
541-592-5360
www.southernoregonguild.org
www.siskiyouguild.org
-------------------------------
Message: 11
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2012 06:11:19 -0700
From: Steven Ferguson <botiemad11@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made
at GMCWS Casa de Fruita rally
To: gmclist@temp.gmcnet.org
Message-ID:
<CAKe9xFQD5bhphHu1Z48Wrz1zd7u9C2xfg1r8WUkF+fjYyNnsaA@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
Just plain EXCELLENT Jerry.
On Sat, Apr 28, 2012 at 10:41 AM, Sharon Work <sharonwork@mac.com> wrote:
> Summary of the Align it Right! presentation made at GMCWS Casa de Fruita
> rally
Jerry Work
The Dovetail Joint
Fine furniture designed and hand crafted in the 1907 former Masonic Temple
building in historic Kerby, OR
Visitors always welcome!
glwork@mac.com
http://jerrywork.com
541-592-5360
www.southernoregonguild.org
www.siskiyouguild.org
_______________________________________________
GMCnet mailing list
Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
_______________________________________________
GMCnet mailing list
Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
Regards,
Rob M. (USAussie)
The Pedantic Mechanic
Sydney, Australia
'75 Avion - AUS - The Blue Streak TZE365V100428
'75 Avion - USA - Double Trouble TZE365V100426
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| Re: [GMCnet] Summary of the Align it Right! presentation madeatGMCWS Casa de Fruita rally [message #167996 is a reply to message #167982] |
Sun, 29 April 2012 19:30 |
|
USAussie
Messages: 15912
Registered: July 2007
Location: Sydney, Australia
Karma: 6
|
Senior Member |
|
|
Matt,
I'm back in Sydney and ahead of the USA time wise. Send me the sports events
for Monday and I'll send you the winners.
Don't laugh, I once had an engineer from Hamilton Standard call me at 2:30
Tuesday morning and when I told him what the time was he asked me; "who won
Monday night football!"
Regards,
Rob M.
-----Original Message-----
From: Matt Colie
Oh - Right,
It's about 8PM and you haven't had your morning coffee - Sure...;)
Matt
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GMCnet mailing list
Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
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Regards,
Rob M. (USAussie)
The Pedantic Mechanic
Sydney, Australia
'75 Avion - AUS - The Blue Streak TZE365V100428
'75 Avion - USA - Double Trouble TZE365V100426
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