Neg. Camber A Arm/ MGB Suspension Question

Hard to know who to ask about this but I'll try this section of the site.

The readily available MGB negative camber A arms are intended to produce around 1 deg negative camber in either an MGA or MGB.

Worked well on my MGA Coupe.

Used them on the Jamaican partially to avoid having to shorten the tie rods BUT the Jamaican also has been converted to MGB front uprights and brakes as it had drums and I couldn't scare up a complete set of 1600 suspension in my parts pile.

Racing, you can run 2 deg or maybe 2.5 deg negative.

The combination of MGB suspension and negative camber A arms installed on an MGA gives -4 deg, however.

I'd be interested to know if anyone has experienced this, and if anyone has any camber figures with stock A arms but MGB suspension on an MGA.

Haven't yet decided whether to live with it (tire wear enhanced) or replace the A arms again.

Bill, interesting stuff. I know diddly squat about suspension geometry. Did the A and B use the same neg camber arms? I'm not sure why, if the neg camber arms produce 1 deg of NC in either A or B that they now produce 4 deg NC in the Jamaican?

Edumacate me here.

Didn't know it did that, never checked on the cars I switched way back - they worked fine with standard lower A arms - but they did stick!
To answer Wray, the difference would be in the changes at the top end, to do with changing the A&B shocks, and the differences in the upper link or swivel pin fitting. All of which implies a difference in the angle between the swivel pin and spindle, a fixed but evidently different (A to B) figure.
Q for Bill - does this car have A or B shocks? I used all B parts on the ones I did.
FRM

Well, this is not really an answer to your question Bill, but could you not "cheat" and shim under the shocks to get the camber angles you want? When I first took apart the front suspension on my TC I found a couple of shim washers under the shock, and I believe is was Barney Gaylord that told me it was a way to adjust camber angles on worn out suspension. I rebuilt the front end and found there was no need for the shims after that.

ps: jamaican is looking good!

Mitch - yes you could shim under shocks to change camber angle, somewhat; whether or not you can get "what you want" could be an issue. It also introduces other changes as the suspension travels, to do with relative pivot position in the upper and lower control arms - maybe good or not.

What I wanna know is, how did that smiley dude get where I typed a "B" and the closing parenthetic mark?'
FRM

I used new MGB shocks.

They must have a slightly shorter upper arm than the MGA ones do, which would mean that you'd end up with negative camber just by doing the MGB suspension swap, and the special lower A arms just add to that.

I'd love to hear if anyone has had their suspension checked after doing the MGB swap.

The way to adjust is to move the shock in or out (the latter in this case) on the mounting platform to alter the camber.

The little smiley dude (emoticon) is generated when you enter certain letter/symbol combinations.

<http://www.mgexperience.net/phorum_faq.php>

Scroll down to see them. Adding a space will keep it from happening. The sunglass smiley guy should go away or have the generating characters changed. You can't do a proper b).