Is rear axle offset common with these cars?

[Rembrant]

Hi Folks,

After installing new 18" Saleen rep wheels with new tires on my '02 GT, I noticed the rear wheels were slightly different from left to right.
The axle appears to be offset to the passenger side by about 5/16".
I did do some Googling and found other people reporting the same...so I guess I'm just trying to confirm if this is common or not?
The car has not been damaged and has had no body work that I'm aware of. Mileage is fairly low at about 70k miles.

I stuck a 5/16" spacer on the left rear wheel, and they are now both perfectly even side to side (about 1/8" inside the fender).
Anybody out there running a spacer on one side only?

I don't know how thick of a spacer I can run on the stock studs, but I'll install longer studs if need be. That's not a big deal.

Just looking for comments or experience from the BTDT crowd. Thanks all.

 

[Mustang5L5]

Yes, common on the fox and sn95 cars, especially if still wearing stock control arms. As the bushings wear and break-down, they may allow for an axle to shift more to one side vs the other. Another factor that comes into play are the two bushings that press into the axle for the upper control arms. Sometimes when replaced they are not pushed in evenly which causes the UCA to pull more in one direction that the other.

You might want to go over your bushings and give them a good inspection.

Of course, even with all fresh bushings, it’s not unheard of for axles to still be slightly offset. That’s what you get with a chassis designed originally in 1978.

 

[Noobz347]

One other tiny note... Many years ago, I happened to put my Fox on a frame machine at a dealership in prep for welding in full length subframe connectors.

Guess what... It was off. Not by a bunch but enough that a correction was required.

If you determine that all of your soft pieces and parts are good and correct, it might be worth consideration. It had not occurred to me at the time, to try and measure myself so, it worked out.

 

[Rembrant]

Thanks for the replies folks. I'll check it over to make sure all is well under there, but being off a bit off from the factory wouldn't surprise me either.
I've had a bunch of 1980-1996 Ford trucks, and sometimes they were way off...completely different of course, body on frame, but still.

 

[Yel2002GTAuto]

It's the way the rear end torque with the body type.... you can get some energy suspension bushings to replace and should help...most just have the torque boxes welded in or replaced and there are kits out there for this...not really needed unless you use sticky tires and launch hard In my opinion...spacer should be fine for normal driving or showcar..

Ed