Hello all! I have a question about my rear wheels. I just noticed this tonight,... One of my wheels, the drivers side I believe but I forget, I'd have to go look at them again (and its dark, so I'll have to do it tomorrow morning)... well lets just say the rear drivers side wheel is slightly angles inward (see illustration below) Basically the picture shows how when looking at my car from the rear you see the one wheel tilted ever so slightly. What is causing this? My manual says that the rear cambers hardly ever have to be adjusted on the 3 series. So is it a shock? Is just one shock bad? The seller told me that they were "fairly" new. (I have no receipts, so I don't know.) Just lemme know what you think!
Alignment maybe?
- Thread starter dandigiacomo
- Start date
Well it is only on one wheel... And its noticable. So maybe it isnt as slight as I said. Either way as I said it is only noticable on one wheel. Thats not normal, is it? And FYI, when looking at the wheel, the bottom portion is further from the car than the top portion. Thats the angle the wheel is at. So it's like the wheel is toe'd 'out', not in. Whats the deal with that?
Hey Jae. Yeah it drives fine. I just don't like how it looks. I'll have it looked at this weekend. I just wanted to know if any of you guys have ever had any problems similar to this. Like if its a common flaw or something... But I guess I've stumped all of ya! I'll just have someone at the dealer up the road look at it, so I can have some peace 
But the car actually wasn't in a bad accident (as far as I know). I did a "Car Fax" report on it before I bought it and unless the whole report was wrong all it said was the buying/selling transactions. It didn't say anything about accidents or recalls. But thanks for the info guys! I'll have a BMW mechanic look at it and I'll let you all know what he said. Hows that sound? (It's not that I don't trust anything you're saying, its just I don't know if I'm explaining the situation correctly,... I'm sure you'd understand if you saw it a little better.) I'll keep you "posted"!
He's not talking about toe angle - he's talking about camber. The top of the wheel is closer to the midline of the car than the bottom of the wheel. E30 BMWs have an inherent negative (I think) camber in the rear, which is what you are describing. There should be some negative camber. However, the two sides of the camber on both sides of the car should technically match and be equal. The alignment might just be off, or there may be a bent trailing arm or something in the rear end. Also, if the car is sagging and riding too low, the camber will be increased on the side that is sagging, because as the suspension is compressed, the camber increases and the top of the wheel tilts in more. The car doesn't lean does it?