Cheap Digital Camber Gauge

A few years ago I used someone's "Smart Camber" digital camber gauge. It was awesome! You could zero it on the ground and measure your camber on uneven ground with 0.1 accuracy. I was going to get my own, but the $250 street price kind of discouraged me. Being the DIY type, I decided to make my own.

Take:

• (1) Digital Level from Sears with 0.1 accuracy which can be found on sale for $35
• (1) 20in long, 1" wide, 1/8" thick piece of steel from Home Depot Racing
• (2) 1" long 1/4" thick metal spacers from HDR
• (2) Allen head 1.5" bolts
• (2) Nuts and washers

Drill a hole on one end of the sheetmetal, then 3 holes for 15, 16 and 17" wheels on the other end. Put in the bolts into the spacers, through the sheetmetal and throw a washer/nut on the other end. The pictures at the end of the post show what I'm talking about. The level attaches to the sheetmetal and is very sturdy as it has a nice big magnet in it.

To do an alignment, just set the gauge on the ground in front of your tire and level out to 0 with the "zero" button. Then place against your wheel and do a tiny bit of math. 88 degrees on the gauge = -2 degrees camber. Easy, accurate to 0.1, and under $40 including all materials. It's been working great the last season and between this, and stringing up the car for toe, I can do pro alignments in the garage or the pits whenever I please. After the lift, the Jeep went to the shop for an alignment, so I got to verify the accuracy of the gauge and it matched their Hunter machine.

I've thought about making a better mount for the level, which would allow me to zero out the gauge vertically, but this has been working so well, I never bothered. If someone comes up with something better, send me a note.

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