CC Plates-Do I Need Them?

The last time I had my Cobra aligned, the tech who did the job told me that when he first put the car on the rack that both sides needed to have the camber adjusted. He said that he was able to get the passenger's side within tolerance and that he was unable to get the drivers side into spec. He says the divers side is barely outside the tolerance range, and the passsengers side is barely within the tolerance range. He recommended that I get a set of CC plates. He said that he would put them on and align the car again. He quoted me a price for installation and although I can't remember how much it was it seemed very reasonable. It want to say it was less than a hundred bucks and that included aligning the suspension again.
The suspension is stock and I plan to leave it that way (no plans to lower).

Questions (based on other threads in Stangnet):

-I've read where people experience noise from their CC plates when going over bumps. Is this something that is also related to other suspension mods (springs, lowering, etc), or to buying cheap hardware? If I install a set of plates, how do I ensure I don't end up with this problem?

-I've also read about people having hood clearance problems after installing plates. Again is this related to lowering the suspension? How do I make sure I don't end up with this?

-I read on another thread here about elongating the mounting holes in the strut towers to gain more camber adjustment range instead of going the CC plate route. Is this a more direct, less complicated approach for solving my alignment problem given that I have no intention of loweing my car's suspension?

-Is the cost of the labor to do the above going to make installing the plates a more sensible option than dropping the struts to enlongate the tower bolts?

-I'm really only interested in getting enough adjustment range so that my alignment guy can get the camber set right once and for all. I live at the beach so anything installed under the hood for visual value or cool points will probably just end up pitted, rusted or corroded in the long run.

Thanks in advance for the advice!
 
camber is not adjustable from the factory, hence many people drive their cars with the camber off. not too big a deal. ive never heard of anyone thinking about getting C/C plates w/ a stock suspension though. strange. anyway, your tires will wear faster if the front end is not aligned, but if its just barely off, like he said, it shouldnt be anything too bad. the tire might go bald 300 miles sooner, no biggie. depends on your finanial situation. if you want to cough up the extra $250 for the plates and $100 for the install/alignment, then go for it. having them is very handy b/c you can adjust the caster and camber.
 
Marine One said:
I was wearing outside edges of both front tires prior to the alignment. I just want to get the most out of the six hundred bucks worth of tires that I installed last week.
how many miles were on the old tires though? 10k or 25k? big difference. personally, if i were in your shoes, i would have bought a set the day he told me to. theyre great to have, and you can use it on your car forever, no matter how many sets of tires you go through
 
DerekStangGT said:
how many miles were on the old tires though? 10k or 25k? big difference. personally, if i were in your shoes, i would have bought a set the day he told me to. theyre great to have, and you can use it on your car forever, no matter how many sets of tires you go through

The outer edges of the tires started to exhibit signs of wear within the first few thousand miles. I initially had it aligned at a different shop, where they only adjusted the toe settings. The wear improved some but didn't completely stop. When I took it to the second place is where the tech loosened the strut bolts and adjusted the camber. Like I said in the original post, he adjusted each side as far as was possible. Again, a slight improvement in tire wear. I didn't do anything else to the car because I was getting ready to deploy to Baghdad for a year and knew that the car was going to be stored. Now that I've been back for a few weeks, I've just installed new tires on the car and am already noticing a slight feathering of the outer edges of the front tires.

I still have concerns about the issues of hood clearence and noisy operation over rough surfaces. Thoughts? Recommendations on a brand of plates?
3-bolt? 4-bolt?
 
Marine One said:
The last time I had my Cobra aligned, the tech who did the job told me that when he first put the car on the rack that both sides needed to have the camber adjusted. He said that he was able to get the passenger's side within tolerance and that he was unable to get the drivers side into spec. He says the divers side is barely outside the tolerance range, and the passsengers side is barely within the tolerance range. He recommended that I get a set of CC plates. He said that he would put them on and align the car again. He quoted me a price for installation and although I can't remember how much it was it seemed very reasonable. It want to say it was less than a hundred bucks and that included aligning the suspension again.
The suspension is stock and I plan to leave it that way (no plans to lower).

Questions (based on other threads in Stangnet):

-I've read where people experience noise from their CC plates when going over bumps. Is this something that is also related to other suspension mods (springs, lowering, etc), or to buying cheap hardware? If I install a set of plates, how do I ensure I don't end up with this problem?

-I've also read about people having hood clearance problems after installing plates. Again is this related to lowering the suspension? How do I make sure I don't end up with this?

-I read on another thread here about elongating the mounting holes in the strut towers to gain more camber adjustment range instead of going the CC plate route. Is this a more direct, less complicated approach for solving my alignment problem given that I have no intention of loweing my car's suspension?

-Is the cost of the labor to do the above going to make installing the plates a more sensible option than dropping the struts to enlongate the tower bolts?

-I'm really only interested in getting enough adjustment range so that my alignment guy can get the camber set right once and for all. I live at the beach so anything installed under the hood for visual value or cool points will probably just end up pitted, rusted or corroded in the long run.

Thanks in advance for the advice!
All of your answers can be found on this page, http://www.maximummotorsports.com/cc.asp

Best C/C Plates out there, drill the 4th hole, install and there you go, no worries.

Some, and I mean a very few amount of C/C plates from MM have had bad bearings (which would be the squeak issue, if not a loose suspension piece) in them, in which they DID replace them for no extra cost
 
DerekStangGT said:
camber is not adjustable from the factory, hence many people drive their cars with the camber off. not too big a deal. ive never heard of anyone thinking about getting C/C plates w/ a stock suspension though. strange. anyway, your tires will wear faster if the front end is not aligned, but if its just barely off, like he said, it shouldnt be anything too bad. the tire might go bald 300 miles sooner, no biggie. depends on your finanial situation. if you want to cough up the extra $250 for the plates and $100 for the install/alignment, then go for it. having them is very handy b/c you can adjust the caster and camber.

Unless they changed the stock plates between '98 and '99+ (which I doubt they did), the Caster AND the Camber are adjustable on the stock plate PROVIDING the original rivits were placed center in the plate holes...

As seen below, there are a set of three small holes that overlap running in both directions (Caster... Camber). You need to drill out the original rivots and then re-rivot after the desired setting is made. Your mechanic will know what to do. I'm sorry I don't have close up pictures of my original plates before I swapped them out.

OriginalCCplate.webp


The price quoted to you for install on after market C/C plates is a very good price. I did mine myself since I was doing struts and springs at the same time but for only the plates... that's reasonable.

Get after market plates and if you do get only the best that have no complaints... 4 bolt Maximum Motorsport C/C plates...

Caster-Camber-Plates-1-640.webp
 

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damn tom, you are getting mean now a days, resembeling your icon quite nicely. also, i'll throw a plug for the same site... the owner is a great guy, great service, and unbeatable prices.

on to the topic though.... CC plates are good... though since he has a 96, i was under the impression that they ONLY had 3 bolts for them.... i'll check again and edit if i am wrong.

I am wrong, just checked MM
 
Torinalth said:
damn tom, you are getting mean now a days, resembeling your icon quite nicely. also, i'll throw a plug for the same site... the owner is a great guy, great service, and unbeatable prices.

I've been around to long, seen questions answered by pm or half assed, only have a certain tolerance :)
 
tomustang said:
I've been around to long, seen questions answered by pm or half assed, only have a certain tolerance :)

That's why I ended up here... some other sites have grown too old on me... and I started getting personal attacks. Here, I'm just me... no one else... :shrug: :SNSign:

On Edit: Btw... I'm actually a member of SN since the late '90s but changed my ID and hence only have history from 2002.