Camber for solid axle?

Good evening folks. I started to take a look at the loose steering issue today and noticed the left front tire is wearing oddly. I took a look from the front and it appears I have a bit of positive camber:? I'm not a suspension guru so I'm not sure how you adjust or even get camber on a solid axle. Is something getting WAY to loose here or just needs an adjustment? The right wheel has a bit of camber too but not nearly as severe. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. Here's a picture of it.

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d46/exilesanhusky/cj2/llean.jpg

 

Its suppost to be that way. The only adjustment that can be made is toe.

 

Hard to tell from the pic but if the wheel is straight ahead it looks like you are toed out. That can give the illusion that camber is off. Check/set toe and then take another look.

 

I agree with nickmil, but the toe would have to be out quite a bit for it to show that much camber. Several other things can cause this; bent housing, king pin/bearing issues, spindle bolts puling out, wheel bearing issues. Usually if you have spindle bolts pulling out, or king pin issues the camber will go the other way (negative). Bent housing can cause a camber change either way depending on how it is bent. Wheel bearings can go either way depending on which bearing and rim offset. It is hard to tell from the picture but that spring looks like it has a twist to it.
Have you jacked up that wheel to see if you have any slop in the k.p. or wheel brgs. Also look for oil seepage where the tube goes into the carrier housing, and the knuckle seal hemisphere is welded to the tube.

 

If the axle U bolts are loose and the axle rotated it will effect camber, but it would affect both sides. Your pinon angle will change too. Look to see if it is parallel to the ground. If you hit an obstical, especially with the brakes on, it may rotate the axle and raise the pinion U-joint, changing the camber. Then dirt builds up under the spring perches and holds it there till you notice it........ After all that, I think it's probably the king pin/bearing. That's more likely.

 

Take your Jeep to the alignment shop and have them check both the caster and camber. Both will cause poor wear patterns on the tires. Caster can be adjusted with shims. Camber plates installed behind the spindles can correct any out of spec readings(given that all the front end components are serviceable)

 

would jack it up and see if you have any movement top to bottom and left to right, if so something is worn out, either kingpin bearing or tie rod end, if all checks out take it to a alingment shop

 

looks to me like it is towed out, and that will make it hard to steer in a straight line

 

Had the problem with the FSJ, due to the shall we say crappy way the front axles were made.
We took the truck to a truck garage that did general repairs. They put the truck on the rack and checked the caster, which was way out of spec. The fix was a tapered shim between the spindle and the steering knuckle. Fixed the problem. No more tires worn on the edge. This was a "44 with open knuckles.
Is it possible this fix would work with the old style front axle?

 

Read the post above and check out the link. You are also confusing caster with camber. Caster is NOT a tire wear angle. Camber however is.
The angled shims could potentially be a repair but the vehicle needs to be put on an alignment machine to truly check all the angles and see what is what.

 

I had a Jeep with Dana 27 axle a few years ago when I worked in a machine shop. It had escessive positive camber on the left side (top of the tire out farther than the bottom). I took the caps for the kingpin bearings and made two new ones. Each offset about .060 of an inch, meaning the stub that goes into the tapered bearing was offset .060 from the shoulder that goes into the houseing to ancher it. The offest was made in the direction of the axle, not front to back with the Jeep. If you placed the top one so the offset was toward the right side of the Jeep, and the the bottom one the same direction, I ended up with the same positive camberWhen I turned the bottom one to the left, opposite the top one, it broad the bottom of the tire out, the top one already turned with offset right already brought the tire in at the top. This gave me barely positive camber on that side, right at the edge of the alignment spec. I imagine the housing had been bent at one time or another as all of the wheel bearings were new, king pin bearings were new and properly shimmed, etc. That was not an easy fix. The front housing I had was the type with floating axle (unlike the fixed early type with shims) so I wasn't worried about U-Joint alignment with the king pin pivot. Maybe I should have been worried, but I never had any binding or unusual noises.