Super Duty Alignment Specs

If you have a truck with Adaptive Steering, you will need your truck’s computer plugged into a advanced driver assistance systems - ADAS Scan Tool and have the pitman arm set to zero to get the alignment correct. DO NOT RESET THE ANGLE WITH THE SCAN TOOL! If there is no access to the ADAS scan tool, set the pitman arm to zero angle in the Off Road area of the dash gauges. Another way to get this correct is to measure the pitman arm to the frame distance before you take the truck apart and make sure the arm is back in that starting location during the alignment. In a Adaptive Steering truck, the steering wheel is not connected to the steering column and will center itself. You will leave the shop with the steering wheel not aligned and over the next 50 to 100 miles it will align itself. Not centering the pitman arm with the computer in the truck will cause problems across many systems in the truck because it will think you are turning all the time and will try to correct this problem. Make sure the technician double checks the pitman arm degrees at zero after the other settings are set. You must not try to straighten the steering wheel in the truck by making the drag link shorter or longer. No old school alignment are allowed on these trucks. Don’t waste your money on a non-computer alignment, it will damage your truck. 

Toe
Toed in on each side, min .12°/ max .18° per side for a total of .36° toe in .18° is optimal or max "in spec" toe in each side.

Camber
Min 0° / Max .5°±, optimal is 0, max cross camber .5° as needed to reduce drift.

Caster

• OUO suspension is designed with 4°-6° degrees of Caster. Factory caster is between 2.2° and 4.9°.
• Caster angle is more of a zone, and you will need to make a 2°change to feel the difference.
• Caster is more forgiving than Camber and Toe are, as seen by the 3° factory variance.
• If you are at 1.5° and add 1/2°, you will not feel much of a change so don’t get too focused on a 1/2° changes.
• Having 4.9° of caster in a Superduty is within factory specs so adding 1° over is not extreme.

• 7° to 8° is aggressive caster and the downside is steering parts will have a bit more load on them.
• We don’t recommend it, but running 7° to 8° would let you be sure caster is not causing your drivability issue and to subdue a persistent death wobble problem.
• When all else fails, with a problem death wobble truck that you have tried everything else, it will help reduce the possibility of a death wobble.

• Ideal cross caster is 1/2°, max cross caster 1° as needed to reduce pulling.

Caster & Camber Information

Negative caster should never be used on any vehicle. If the question is positive or negative caster, the answer is always, 100% of the time, positive caster. Cross Caster is the difference in caster between the two sides of the vehicle. Cross caster can result in the vehicle pulling to the Lower number side. For instance, if drivers’ side has 2.3 degrees and the passenger side has 2.6 degrees this should get the truck to go straight on a crowned road but could pull to the driver side on flat road. After the parts and tires have been ruled out, most alignment techs will take a closer look at cross caster as directional control angle, which is taught in many wheel alignment classes today. However, cross camber also affects directional stability, but it is usually ignored because camber also impacts tire wear. Some vehicles in production today have steering axis inclination (SAI) values of 9°, or even higher, to improve vehicle stability. On these vehicles with higher SAI values, the cross camber can be more effective in resolving drift than cross caster.

*motor.com

One of the common handling-related complaints brought to an alignment shop is "drift" - usually meaning the vehicle fails to continue straight when allowed to choose its own path. Many times, an alignment tech is able to easily resolve drift issues, but not always. Making adjustments and then failing to impact a drift issue or satisfy the customer's complaint can be frustrating. Tire pressure is the #1 thing to always check. It is very, very common for drivability issues to be caused by tires. Some brands of new, with zero-mile tires do not drive nice on solid axle trucks and no alignment will fix this. Never rule out the tires for being the problem because you can chase .2° alignment changes for months only to swap out the tires and it is a completely different truck.

Let's clarify drift by popular definition: with no driver input, the vehicle will change one full lane in about 1/8 to 1/4 of a mile on a straight, level road. By contrast, a "pull" is when the vehicle changes lanes faster, about less than 1/8 of a mile. The deliberate use of cross camber we're discussing here is only viable for drifts because a pull would require camber values that are unacceptable for tire wear, and something more serious is possibly wrong. The high value of SAI has a larger influence on vehicle directional stability compared to the relatively smaller caster values. This is why changes in cross caster don't have much effect on drift on certain vehicles. Instead, try small changes in cross camber by biasing it in the appropriate direction while staying within the OE specified camber range.

For instance, a vehicle with a left camber of -0.5°, right camber of -0.5° and a drift to the left. This could be corrected by moving the left to -0.75° and the right to -0.5°, or the left to -0.75° and the right -0.25°. Both settings would stay below the typical cross camber maximum of 0.5° and should create enough drift-right to counter the original complaint of drift-left.