Shop troubles... Some Advise would be nice.

I took my 3g into the tire shop for an alignment because it was pulling to the left... When they were done it was pulling to the left more.

They told me it was because my rack was not returning to center properly. And that the alignment was only off by about 1/2 degree for caster on the drivers side.

Here are my symptoms.

1) Pulls to the left most of the time... Unless I am on a heavily banked road.
2) When backing up at moderate speed and turning the steering wheel to the right it will just about rip the steering wheel out of my hands and wants to bank all the way right. Plus it is difficult to get back to center... (At least to get it out of the apex that it goes into)
3) Has a lot of shake at low speeds that clears up at higher speeds.
4) Tires look like they are not centered in the wheel well. They look like they are sitting way back. ( This is on both sides but the left looks closer than the right )
5) When driving at 50 mph plus A minor correction moving to the left will veer to the left dramatically. But it will return to the right easily.

Any advise on this would be great. I have an appointment Monday with a different shop to get a second opinion but I would like to go in there as informed as possible. I have some experience with this and it really seams to me that the caster is off and that the shop I took it to aligned the caster wrong.

Plus my appointment was at 5:00 on a Friday... We all know how that one goes!

Well I think that shop is slow and they want business. I think it just needs a minor adjustment of toe in toe out to make it better. Are the wheels balanced? Does your springs or struts sag? Like is one side of the car lower than the other? I replied more in depth in the thread where you wanted to buy a rack and pinion.

-mike

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Originally Posted by Mike's89AccordLX

Well I think that shop is slow and they want business. I think it just needs a minor adjustment of toe in toe out to make it better. Are the wheels balanced? Does your springs or struts sag? Like is one side of the car lower than the other? I replied more in depth in the thread where you wanted to buy a rack and pinion.

-mike

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If they are slow and just wanted business... They lost mine. They charged me $50.00 for an alignment and then when I went back and complained they basically said that there was no way they could have aligned it wrong... and all of my problems were because of my tires and rack. They were not even willing to put it back on the machine and check.

" Its just a good old car What do you expect" is what they said to me... Believe me if the other shop fixes this they are going to get an earfull.

man, your alignment is horrible... go to another shop... to be honest, anybody that's been around cars can eyeball that and be better than what you have...

and sounds to me that your caster is quite off... i think that this shop is jerkin you around in a bad way...

They should have given you a printout of the readings before and after. The numbers would be of great help if you could post them . Without these numbers all anyone can do is speculate.

If you paid with a check or a credit card I would put a stop payment on the check or notify your CC company and file a comlaint through them

Don't cancel your check. That makes you the bad guy. If the other shop fixes it get a printout from them and then show the old shop the results and then tell them you want your money back or your going to take them to court. If they say screw off which I doubt they will do then type up a nice letter to the better business bureau. And also if they dont give your money back tell them that your going to contact the better business bureau.

If your wheels are moved back in the wheel wells, that means that your radius rods are not adjusted correctly. This will throw off your caster which will cause the steering symptoms that you are describing. What the shop probably did was a toe in alignment, instead of a full alignment. First find a different shop and make sure you have them do a complete check and adjustment of the front suspension. The vibration may be a result of your misalignment, but I would fix one thing at a time to find the problem. Hope this helps.

Cool thanks for the advice so far.

They did not give me a before and after printout. They were in too big of a hurry to get me out the door...

I went by a frame shop today and they said basically that the caster was so far off that it would make the steering very touchy and make it wander.

The (Bad) shop did a caster alignment (the Only thing they did besides inspection ) but I am about 90% sure that they aligned the left to the right instead of aligning it to specs. I think it needs to move forward about 1 inch or so... It is so far back that the 185-70-13 tires almost touch the fenderwell.

Although I really did not fully understand how to read the system they used, it looked the right caster was at -2.5 degrees. This converts to about 2 3/8 " back... This seems like an awfull lot but I think it is possible.

Not the most accurate measurements but here is what I have.

Left tire to front of well = 4" rear of tire to well = 2"
Right tire to front of well = 4.5" rear of tire to well = 1.5"