What changes, mechanically, when a vehicle’s alignment changes due to driving conditions? Do the bolts loosen, does metal bend, or is it something else?
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Oh I can answer this one. Yes parts loosen, parts bend, other parts wear out. When hitting a pothole but not damaging anything it can just shift everything slightly. Do that over and over and your alignment is messed up. The fact that everything is adjustable means that things will need to be adjusted.
Metal bends a little bit and boots loosen a little bit every time it is used. Stop a bit too hard? Stuff gets messed up. Hit a pot hole? stuff gets messed up. Its only a little bit. But a lot of little bits over a lot of time add up to the alignment being off and needing it all to be refixed.
>Do the bolts loosen, does metal bend, or is it something else?
Yes, yes and yes.
The drivetrain of your car is a collection of moving parts, and these need checked and adjusted periodically. Every time you hit a pothole or bump up a kerb you are putting a force through all the bolts and members which will cause them to eventually weaken and bend, and all of the wearing parts of the system like the bushings and bearings will be slowly wearing and loosening over time.
The thing that affect alignment the most are parts-bending and parts-wearing.
Most moving parts are attached with a flexible something. And it sooner or later give way a bit.
Then your car’s frame is a living organism. Don’t think just about the mechanical links, also the frame does bend.
Talking about wheels, it doesn’t take much to go off balance, few millimeters do matter a lot. Tiny otherwise unnoticeable changes can be very noticeable in the alignment department. One degree off for a frame is nothin, for a wheel attached to it, is the difference between aligned and awful asymmetric wear.
You hit things, metal bends. Vehicle allignment depends on multiple structural elements connected together. The resultant of their arrangement is the sum of their dimensions and placements. Small changes can result in big displacements. It doesn’t take much to screw up the allignment.
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