After fooling with strings, weights and lines for alignments and measurements every time I moved the bike I finally got fed up enough to do something to make my life a little easier. Strings and weights are a time tested method, but are mostly a PITA since the proliferation of inexpensive lasers entered the alignment process. You want straight? Doesn't get much straighter than a beam of light.
I looked at retail solutions, bit they're all foolishly expensive for what they are. Good luck finding a kit under a grand. But they make for a fairly easy template to follow.
For example:
I can make something accurate and effective out of most of what I have lying around in the shop. It will also be a lot easier to set up than strings and easier to store than a couple 8 foot lengths of metal stock. Not to mention strings, wood or metal bars aren't guaranteed to be true. even if it's just out a few MM, that can compound as you start letting a few mm's go here and few go there. Lasers are about as straight as you're going to get it.
So I started planning and building today.
I had a fistful of small lasers in the electronics drawer (can be had on eBay for a couple bucks apiece) and a bit of digging pulled out a couple red line lasers. A bit more rooting in the electronics drawers produced and old cell phone wall charger with the proper voltage. Bodged it together quickly, plugged it in and there's my laser alignment lines.
Now I needed a way to mount them.
Couple chunks of aluminum scrap and some time on the lathe and I had a couple mounts to hold each of the lasers. A couple pieces of all-thread and nuts will allow me to dial in the squareness of the laser block to the jig/wheel clamp.
Now I needed a way to make clamps for the wheels. An old bedframe that's been lying around produces enough angle iron to make the wheel clamps. They're easily made, just a piece on either side of the wheel and a piece of all thread to clamp them on. A little vinyl tuning will protect the rim from the all-thread.
A couple more angle iron pieces will make the front wheel clamp.
Then I'll make a graduated scale for the leading and trailing edge of the front tire clamp on each side. Probably just pick up a couple cheap rulers for the scales.
The lasers will be attached to the rear wheel and shine forward on to the front wheel scales. That will let me measure the alignment and the offset of the wheels and correct as needed.
As a double check for front and rear wheels running a parallel track, I"ll mount another laser on the front clamp shining rearward so I can compare the front and rear laser lines on the floor.
A protractor on the front and rear wheel clamps will check for wheels running in the same vertical plane.
Another protractor to check across the frame rails to make sure the bike is sitting level/perfectly vertical when alignments are made.
And lastly, for my own build, I'll mount an line laser on the steering stem with an arbor (having a lathe is sooo handy!) so I can measure the rear wheel offset from the the frame centerline. Useful info if I find it pulls one way of the other once back together.
All said and done, I should be all in for about 50-60 bucks and the time it takes to fab it up. A lazy weekend afternoon would get it just about done.
Pictures to follow when I get something completed worth looking at.
Some might ask why go through all this trouble for a shaftie as the alignment is set by the way it's built and there's no real adjustments available like a chain bike. This is true, but I'm building it and setting the alignment as I go with rear wheel and swingarm construction. Once set, it should be good unless something gets bent.
I also have a couple other chain drive bikes (FJ and the VF), so a laser alignment tool is going to be helpful in setting those up on a yearly (or as needed) basis. For the chain drive bikes, I'll also make up a chain laser alignment tool. That one's simple: Just a laser holder and make it's faces square.
