Alright, I had my 3rd alignment and second set of tires put on today within 2000 miles. The shop I went to today came recomended by the local vette guru's. I have come to the conclusion that these people at tire/alignment shops are total and complete idiots!!! Before I even had them do anything I took the car in and asked them myself (recommendation or not) and asked the owner "CAN YOU PROPERLY ALIGN THIS CAR?" He replied Oh yea I do them all the time.

I picked the car up 4 hours later and he said it was done. The car drove great I was so happy that I went on a 40 mile drive through the country roads by my house. About 30 miles into my drive I hear the sound of steel rattling around u7nder my car and look in my rear view mirror to see shiny things bouncing on the road. Well I thought I ran over something and didnt give it a second thought. Started to change my oil when I got home and noticed all! my shims were gone. How the hell do shims just fall out? The first 2 guys claimed they new what they were doing as well.

I have never done anything on my car myself that just fell off! These guys in commercial shops are bubba's & butchers! :U

 

Sorry to hear that story. :smash:

I'd have sent you to Calagy Tire on Babcock Street, Palm Bay (Melbourne), Fla. If Pete did the job I'd have given you my own personal double-or-nothing money back guarantee that you'd be pleased with a job done right. But you'd have said that was too far to drive.

Surely someone in your area can do a decent alignment job. At least you know who not to use now. Good luck.

 

OMG! :eek:
The Shims fell out!
Now you gotta ask yourself if you want to take it back there and let them F with it AGAIN!

:U

 

I dunno. I hope you try to get your money back, though! I'd be furious.

Try looking for Corvette shops in the area... or in other areas. Might be worth it for the drive.

I'm considering getting a "quicky" alignment done here when I have all my suspension mods done, then taking the vette down to Santa Barbara to have the mighty Guldstrand give it a shot.

-Steve

 

I have a confession to make. I bought a new set of tires 1 year ago, and I have not had my car alligned. I have been watching the tires very closely for any signs of wear or uneven wear..... so far so good. It's just that the one guy I will take my vette to does not do allignments and the allignment shops I will not take my vette to.... :( MJ

 

I am going to by the neccessary tools to the job and learn how to do it right. Then no longer will I go to a tire/alignment butcher :U


I feel better now Thanks for listening :) Group hug :lol: :lol:

 

Buy a caster/camber gauge and a laser level and figure it out yourself. It will take longer to do than the "pros" with alignment machines, but you won't "forget" to tighten something or lose shims, or any of the other stupid things that can happen. There are good shops out there: you just have to find someone who cares about what they do. Pride in workmanship seems to be disappearing too quickly. "Good enough" seems to be a mantra these days...

 

You mentioned alignments and struck a nerve. I'll spare the details. :mad

Get the stuff and do it yourself. :cheers:

 

Ya it :cuss when they scew up. I rebuilt my hole front end on my 75 chevy truck and I broght in for alignment and they told me I need some ball joints and a idler arm. And every thing was new under there including the springs. I told them it was all new and they said it was bad anyways and would not do the work unless I bought the new parts. I was :mad and went next door and the shop there said the truck was in perfect and did the alignment. The tech that did the work came up front and siad who ever did the new parts install did a super nice job. That was me :D And that was the last alignment I ever needed for that truck.

 

A good alignment guy is hard to find, especially hard to find someone good with 63-82 vettes. A C3's front end is just like any other chevy of the day, simply add and remove shims till everything is in factory spec or where you want the spec to be. The back end is pretty unique to the corvette, I just did the rear on mine recently at work and it came out great, even though I had to fight the rear trailing arm shims a bit to get them out since they were all rusted together (put everything back together with stainless). A lot of the time the problem is that the shop either doesn't want to spend the time to get everything right on a vette or the technician didn't want to spend the time to get everything right,(especially if they are paid against flat rate vs straight hourly),corvettes normally take longer to align then most cars due to the rear suspension. I trust our alignment guy to work on my vette, actually he did the front end alignment and I later did the rear after the smart struts were installed. My point here is that there are competent alignment people out there you just have to locate them. Micks 69, it sounds like you got a case of the forgot to tighten the bolts up syndrome, hard telling what caused this, but my guess would be he got pulled away from your car when he was about to tighten those bolts and when he got back to it he probably thought he did and backed it out, the fault then being that he didn't double check. Everyone makes mistakes occasionally, I'd give them the chance to at least try to make it up to you, but don't go in there demanding things, yelling and screaming, simply tell them what happened and ask what they can do to remedy the situation. Chances are if they are a good shop they will give you your money back and realign the car for free. At least that's what I would do as a service writer If this were the situation and I was approached in that way.

:cheers:
Pat Kunz

 

I do my own also.. Here is a tip.. First make (buy) four 18" square X 1/8" thick pieces of nylon or teflon. Smear some grease on two and put the others on top. Now you have some slick pads . Drive.. (Don't jack the car ) onto the plates. Now you can adjust the toe or camber vey easy because the plates allow the wheels to move easy. It is important to drive forward onto the plate so you will be setting everything up under the correct load.

 

I'd did it myself and I am very pleased with the results, although it took 3 tries to get the 4 wheel alignment right so the car didn't "dog track" (rear wouldn't track with the front). This was easy to tell because I had to steer the car a little to one side to get it to go down the street straight. You can get the supplies you need from Racer Parts Wholesale (www.racerpartswholesale.com).

The tools I used were:
Tape, string, and a ruler to get the rear wheel toe- in correct to the front tires
Caster-Caber Gage PPR-9100 (does wheel from 13-18" in dia.) $140
Toe Adapter PPR-9110 $50
Slip Plates RPW-9510 $70 (ground metal plates that slide on each other to allow suspension to settle)

Took me approx. 4 hr. total to do the job. Good luck
http://temp.corvetteforum.net/c3/greatwhite/

 

I have three similar stories except not as bad as yours with parts falling off. First I took my wife's Chrysler for alignment. They charged me; told me to pickup the car; I drove it about 300 yards; turned around and demanded my money back, telling them they never touched the car. They gave me my money back -- no argument. I was right; they never touched the car.
Later, I took the Chrysler in for a new power steering actuator. When I got my car back my wife complained that the steering was sloppy. I tried it and she was right. I looked under the car and the whole steering mechanism was held on by only one bolt that was BARELY screwed in. If that bolt had come loose, then at 70 mph the car would have careened off the road, killing or injurying my beloved wife.
Finally, I have an old Ford. Took it to two shops for alignment. Both charged me, but I still think they didn't do a thing. I aligned it myself.
With mechanics like the above, I will try to do all work myself.

 

did mine too. Made extra shims from scrap aluminum.
Tip: find a level spot or mark the floor degrees + or-.

 

Most of those shops are just interested in getting the car in and out with your money in their hand. Customer service and taking the time to make sure it's done completely is few and far between these days. :(

 

That's really too bad you can't find someone reputable to do that kind of work. I do mostly everything on my car - except alignment. But we have an excellent shop here that does an incredible job. Guess I should be thankful.