Geometry requirements. The German marque

[Tony]

Below is the pre-geometry requirements for most VAG/ German marques. Failure to comply to all fields will make any information gathered redundant.

Measurement Requirements

- Vehicles with air suspension must be allowed to cool

- Vehicle unladen

- Fuel tank must be full

- Spare wheel and vehicle toolbox must be in vehicle and correctly stowed

- The windscreen/ headlight wash container must be full

- Difference in tread depth on a given axle to be no more than 2mm

- Tyres must be inflated to correct pressure

- Assemble alignment equipment in accordance with the equipment manafacturure's instructions

- Check suspension, steering and steering gear for excessive play or damage

- Do not carry out wheel alignment until vehicle has been driven 1000 to 2000 km, because coil springs will not have settled until then

- Check rims are not damaged at the rim lip or shoulder

- Verify ride height values

- Drive the vehicle into the alignment bay with the suspension relaxed or relax the suspension by rolling the vehicle forwards and backwards in the measurement bay

- Before starting the initial measurement or before starting adjustment work, the steering drag/ pull has to be balanced by moving steering wheel equally to both sides. Use the steering wheel level

 

Taking an average labour cost at the dealers to be £130+ vat ph. Add the cost for fuel if under the checking level and then add the cost of a tyre or four then your cost for a full geometry could be between £500 to £1000 or more!

[Rich]

5 hours ago, Tony said:

Failure to comply to all fields will make any information gathered redundant.

Is that what VAG say or you?

Tyre pressures don't affect the geometry do they? And things like the spare wheel and toolbox seems abit OTT.

[Tony]

This is direct from VAG... Tyre pressure does affect the geometry readings and I've tested by how much? Between a correctly inflated and -50% the disparity is around 2 minutes geometrically. What most don't realize is the disparity front to rear with the rear being -2 psi affects the castor measurement, not camber and not toe.  The reason for this is the castor measurement is an imaginary line drawn through the sprung chassis and the unsprung chassis. If the pressure is lower at the rear then the upper parallelogram will lower thus extending the imaginary castor pick-up point.