Daytona Suspension Settings

Paul: It depends on how you intend to use the car.

 

for street use for me.

 

Paul:

Front:

Toe: Factory setting was 3mm IN Total toe. Today most cars run less than this to enhance "turn-in". I use about 1-2mm Total IN.

Caster: Factory was 1.5 ° Positive. I use about 1.2-1.3 ° Positive. Daytona's have fairly heavy steering so no reason to make things worse.

Camber: Factory was about 1° POSITIVE. This is theory from the 1930s, and has been replaced by more modern thinking. For street use, I aim for 0°.

Rear:

Toe: Factory was 2-3 mm IN Total Toe. More rear toe will help stability under braking, but increases rear tire wear substantially. I aim for 1.5 MM IN Total. The cars drive well and the rear tires last longer.

Camber: Factory was 2.2-2.5 ° Negative. I use 1.8 ° Negative, again to minimize tire wear. For aggressive driving use the factory settings.

All these settings should be with the car loaded with two people (or equivalent weight) plus a full tank of fuel. While this is ideal, at least try to duplicate the conditions under which you will use the car.

I am sure others will have varying opinions, but these have worked well for me for years.

 

I think Dwights comments are spot on but I will ad this. Few shops really understand alignment and if their rack doesn't tell them what to do they are lost. Find a good alignment specialist or a Ferrari specialist really dialed in on alignment. I worked in one so they do exist. Hopefully it will not be a shop that looks at a Daytona as a piece of alien technology.

 

Brian: Thank you for adding this. I was going to do it also. Good alignment shops are not easy to find. I prefer one that uses Hunter equipment (the owner is a great car collector and frequent Pebble Beach entrant, also super nice man). Make sure they understand you will pay for whatever amount of time it takes to get the car correct to where you want it. Aligning a Daytona is not a "standard" four-wheel alignment job.

 

I agree with Dyke and Brian about the good alignment shop and equipment, not to mention operators understanding how to accurately perform proper alignment on something like Daytona and wish to add something not yet mentioned, but often seemingly ignored or overlooked procedure (and my long established pet-peeve, if you will), i.e. setting the correct a ride height prior to checking/setting alignment as it is a baseline all other geometry specifications are (or originally were) based on.

I feel fortunate to have a good, long term relationship with a local "old school" alignment shop (with a Hunter rack) where they let me do all the physical work, i.e. "wrenching", on all of my jobs, including but not limited to Daytonas or other vintage Ferraris, while the alignment guy just double checks the readings and assists me, if needed, allowing me to take whatever time it requires.
They usually just clear their daily schedule, especially when I book a appointment for a Daytona or something similar, since it can easily take several hours (or more) to dial one in and that is after a day or two I've already first spend setting the right height accurately.

Oh, and another, rather obvious thing not yet mentioned would be to make sure any and all other alignment/suspension/steering related components and consumables (ball-joints, bearings, bushings, insulators, tie-rod ends, tires, etc) are freshly serviced and in excellent working condition before attempting any ride height and alignment adjustments.

 

And what it's worth, if anything, none of the Daytonas I've worked on over the years had their ride height, especially front, even with all fresh/new/restored components, including new springs, etc initially anywhere near factory designated engineering spec.
Same appears to be the case with most I've seen (and learned to observe) from photos and/or in-person at events/shows as a spectator or a judge.
Just ask your fellow Daytona owners how many have ever/often experienced front suspension bottoming out or tire rubbing during spirited drives on rough, twisty roads or even going over curbs and speed bumps at lower speeds and/or how many have had this issue remedied with some aftermarket, adjustable coil-over conversions ?

 

Unless the alignment shop you use specializes in exotics/vintage Ferraris, they are probably not going to have the correct factory Ferrari type alignment shims and will just resort to using generic shims that don't support the yokes for the lower control arms like the factory shims.

Hill Engineering makes a very nice alignment shim kit https://www.hillengineering.co.uk/shims/shim-set, where the quality of the shims is better than the factory Ferrari shims. It only costs £49 for 40 shims. I would recommend purchasing the kit and providing it with the car when you bring it in for an alignment.

Brian Brown
Grand Touring Enterprises
Frederick, MD

 

thank yoo Brian for joining in. very important info.

 

Brian: Great point.

 

As long as we are going into the weeds with this thread, almost nobody sets up the front tie rods correctly on Ferraris with a standard steering box (like a Daytona).

1. Lock the steering wheel in the straight-ahead position.

2. Adjust the driver side SHORT tie rod so the driver's front wheel in pointing straight ahead.

3. Measure the center-to-center length of the driver's side short tie rod.

4. Adjust the passenger side SHORT tie rod to the SAME length.

5. Adjust the passenger side front wheel to the straight-ahead position using the CENTER (long) tie rod.

6. Set the prescribed toe by adjusting BOTH short tie rods equally.

7. You may need to change the lengths of both SHORT tie rods to "center" the steering wheel after actually driving the car. This slight variance in lengths is not a problem.

All this work needs to be done to make sure the car reacts the same when being turned to the left as it does when turned to the right.

 

^ wow! thanks Dyke. thats detailed info.

 

While the shop whose equipment and facilities I use doesn’t “specialize in exotics/vintage Ferraris”, per se, this ^^ is why I do all my client car alignments myself and have large assortment of proper shims, both OEM (new, used, re-plated) and HE reproductions.
Being a bit OCD, I also re-stack shims after the final results to have least amount of individual shims at each adjustment point.

 

Paul, all the factory alignment data/specs, including the ride height are in the service/shop manual.

After you’ve obtained your ride height readings, I’d be interested in knowing and would appreciate if you could share them with me, even if just via PM.

 

I’ve never understood why anyone could or would do it differently, but apparently there are many who can/will.

Interestingly enough perhaps (at least for me), only time I truly struggled to achieve equal left & right turning efforts/radius/etc was maybe 10-15 years ago on a Cord L-29. Spent huge amount time checking, comparing, cross referencing and sharing measurements of any and all related components with owners, experienced mechanics & restorers more familiar with identical cars and willing to assist me, even borrowed some NOS steering linkage components for physical comparisons, only to find that everything in the car I was working on appeared to be correct and un-damaged, but for some reason defied logic and would not allow me to achieve the intended objective without having to design and fabricate an adapter modification.

 

I would check with MCP for the manual, although your favorite vintage Ferrari mechanic/shop may (should) already have a copy.

As for your willingness to share the alignment results, I personally would be more interested in “before” numbers of both front and rear ride height measurements as I’ve been collecting that data for years and even designed/developed solutions to correct the discrepancies commonly plaguing them, especially the front, while still allowing the use of all OEM components.

 

Hi Paul,

Hope you enjoy sprucing-up your car; it is the journey that counts...

Regarding the Shop Manual, the cheapest source that I found was Superformance (no issues shipping from UK):

https://www.superformance.co.uk/365-gtb4/accessories.html

Economical enough that I have two (one for clean hands, and one for oily hands... ).

Oh, and the Shop Manual defines "ride height" as a difference between the distances from the ground of the A-arm pivots; which basically defines the angle that the A-arm makes compared to a level plane (takes tire and wheel differences out of the equation).

Cheers,
Alex

 

… when assuming tire inflation pressures, sizes (including wheels) and wear from side-to-side are identical.

Care to share your current ride height figures with me, especially front, Alex (I promise to keep them confidential, if you so prefer) ?