94 k1500 alignment issues
- Thread starter Jjbiskup
- Start date
Disclaimer: Links on this page pointing to Amazon, eBay and other sites may include affiliate code. If you click them and make a purchase, we may earn a small commission.
That appears to be an older incident as it's surface rusted over the impact point. It would have taken an impact like coming down on a rock etc to do that amount of damage to a frame rail.
That's small enough to get fixed with a big crescent wrench and a cheater pipe.
The "new tires on the rear" is a industry standard that is becoming more prevalent. Best I can tell, it's driven by whack-job lawyers outright paranoid about oversteer, instead of actual vehicle-dynamics engineers.
The front tires of a wrong-wheel drive car do all of the steering, all of the motivation, and about 80% of the braking. The rear tires keep the bumper from dragging. So clearly the front tires are the most important and ought to be in the best condition. But NOOOOooooo, the lawyers are scared to death that the rear-end of the vehicle will swing out uncontrollably.
However, paying for an alignment and it not being correct is an entirely different matter.
First Guess: Nothing but toe is adjustable without additional costs for some kind of alignment "kit", plus labor to install it, plus shop supplies, tax, shipping and "handling" and every other additional charge they can dream up.
Second Guess: The guy actually doing the alignment work cares only that the vehicle is "in spec", not that it performs properly. And test-drives are also becoming a thing of the past. Nobody pays the labor for a test drive, the best you can hope for is that the guy takes your car through the drive-thru at lunch--and pays attention to how it runs/drives.
The front tires of a wrong-wheel drive car do all of the steering, all of the motivation, and about 80% of the braking. The rear tires keep the bumper from dragging. So clearly the front tires are the most important and ought to be in the best condition. But NOOOOooooo, the lawyers are scared to death that the rear-end of the vehicle will swing out uncontrollably.
However, paying for an alignment and it not being correct is an entirely different matter.
First Guess: Nothing but toe is adjustable without additional costs for some kind of alignment "kit", plus labor to install it, plus shop supplies, tax, shipping and "handling" and every other additional charge they can dream up.
Second Guess: The guy actually doing the alignment work cares only that the vehicle is "in spec", not that it performs properly. And test-drives are also becoming a thing of the past. Nobody pays the labor for a test drive, the best you can hope for is that the guy takes your car through the drive-thru at lunch--and pays attention to how it runs/drives.
Sorry, I felt bad for bringing up a Kia here so deleted the post before I saw any responses.....
I called the shop today to tell them it still pulled to the right and because I noticed the camber on the printout was off.
He acted surprised it pulled and I asked if it should track straight. He said yes but there is no way to adjust camber on the Rondo? I haven't checked yet...
That's the thing, they don't just give out the printed sheet unless you ask for it. I knew I had forgotten to punch out the tabs on my Yukon for the upper control arms when I brought my truck in last year but figured maybe the camber was still good. It wasn't until I left that I called and asked for a printout and saw my camber was off. They never mentioned anything about it...
Same here.... They just send you on your way saying everything is finished..
Guy said probably worn suspension parts but couldn't be specific....
jeez...
Seems a little different than not worrying about painting the inside of your pantry closet above the door because nobody will ever see it....
I called the shop today to tell them it still pulled to the right and because I noticed the camber on the printout was off.
He acted surprised it pulled and I asked if it should track straight. He said yes but there is no way to adjust camber on the Rondo? I haven't checked yet...
That's the thing, they don't just give out the printed sheet unless you ask for it. I knew I had forgotten to punch out the tabs on my Yukon for the upper control arms when I brought my truck in last year but figured maybe the camber was still good. It wasn't until I left that I called and asked for a printout and saw my camber was off. They never mentioned anything about it...
Same here.... They just send you on your way saying everything is finished..
Guy said probably worn suspension parts but couldn't be specific....
jeez...
Seems a little different than not worrying about painting the inside of your pantry closet above the door because nobody will ever see it....
Attachments
It kills me that shops just toe-and-go and don't even try to upsell you on fixing stuff that's actually broken and causing your alignment to be out. A couple months ago I had my Mustang aligned (it sits so low that paying $100 for an alignment is far easier than the DIY method), and a week or so later I started getting some skittishness in the steering. I finally tore it down and found the ball joint was bad. It had to have been showing, but the guy aligning the car never mentioned it. Now I need to take it to get aligned again. Now I need to find another alignment shop., because I obviously can't trust them.
They passed up easy money on the upsell, and not likely because they didn't want to make money, but more likely because they were too lazy to do a quick inspection. That's incompetence.
They passed up easy money on the upsell, and not likely because they didn't want to make money, but more likely because they were too lazy to do a quick inspection. That's incompetence.
Yes, and no. Most Macpherson strut suspensions have no provisions for adjusting camber unless you install camber plates. There are offset bushings, etc., that you can use to crutch the alignment, but something's bent.
I dont think i mentioned this but they did not charge me for the alignment, they corrected the toe but not the steering wheel being off, they actually corrected the wrong side first to match the toe of the bent side, ill end up just going to an alignment shop when i get the time. Ended up rear ending someone on the way to work in the rain because my brakes locked up and i started sliding. Ended up bending my smoothie bumper to hell. Trucks been more bad than good to me lately.
