Any Alignment Gurus?

[mikey12]

2005 GMC Yukon XL. Tree hit it in the front, was able to drive - no fluid loss. Dealer kept it a bit over a month and got it back with alignment problem. Complained, said to bring it back and would take it back to their alignment shop (which is a local tire chain store that advertises home of free alignment). Rather than have them keep it any longer (long story), I took it to a buddy's - buddy shop and had him run it through the ringer. My complaints are it pulls to the left and when holding straight line on flat, non-crowned or sloped road, the steering wheel points at 1 o'clock. Also at highway speeds, doing a shake side to side of the wheel made the front end squirrely like it was separate from the rest of the vehicle.

Guy found camber slightly out of range and corrected. It fixed the odd feeling when doing the side-to-side swing of the steering wheel at highway speed, but still pulls to the left (not extreme, but enough to constantly correct for it) and the steering wheel still needs to point to 1 o'clock to go straight. Alignment data sheet is below:

Can anyone take this data and determine if anything is bent? I know I-Car has some charts to help, but figured someone smarter than me can determine what the deal is.

Wreck reference pictures:

 

[moribundman]

Originally Posted By: mikey12
Tree hit it in the front


I hate it when trees jump out into the street!

 

[mechtech2]

Those specs are pretty good, and pretty mild.
They may be wrong because they are STATIC settings, and loose, bent, of worn parts allow movement when driving.
The bottom line is that even the steering wheel is not centered, so I would return it to the guy who did it and get it straightened out.
Didn't he drive it?

 

[mikey12]

Originally Posted By: mechtech2
Those specs are pretty good, and pretty mild.
They may be wrong because they are STATIC settings, and loose, bent, of worn parts allow movement when driving.
The bottom line is that even the steering wheel is not centered, so I would return it to the guy who did it and get it straightened out.
Didn't he drive it?


He drove it to and from the parking lot from the garage... Dealer would of had to drive it a few miles to their shop of choice. It was free so I can't complain about the buddy doing it, but the dealer on the other hand. Right after the wreck the steering wheel had to be pointed at about 3 o'clock to go straight. I was going to take it back to the dealer's collision center, but wanted some ammunition to tell them what to fix and where to stick the bent parts.

 

[ewetho]

The readings provided are fine, you really need more like wheel track, wheel base, ride height etc...

You need to know if the frame is straight. Are the wheel pointed the same way but dog tracking anyway. Like the front axle is not directly ahead of the rear wheel but off center and also the wheel base for each side to make sure that is also correct. Make sure ride height is correct as well so the reading you got are correct for the vehicle.

But before you do that just make sure you don't have a damaged tire and rotate the fronts side to side and see if it is still the same.

In the end you might find a ICar specialist to check your truck is square again.

 

[RH+G]

Specs look good. Check air pressure in tires. Also might have a worn steering part. Do a shake down of the front end. I highly doubt u have any frame damage. You might want to rotate ur tires. Are the tires worn bout the same left to right?

 

[mikey12]

Originally Posted By: RH+G
Specs look good. Check air pressure in tires. Also might have a worn steering part. Do a shake down of the front end. I highly doubt u have any frame damage. You might want to rotate ur tires. Are the tires worn bout the same left to right?


Haven't done a shake down yet - too dang cold and too much snow to get under it. Tires are brand new - dealer installed them before sale. Have about 6K miles on them. Alignment was fine before the tree incident.

 

[mikey12]

Originally Posted By: moribundman
I hate it when trees jump out into the street!


Yep, was in the middle of the road at the bottom of a small hill...

Snow covered road with no reference and a sharp 90* turn at the end which the GMC felt was too sharp to make and introduced itself to the tree..at about 20MPH

 

[ewetho]

Rotate the tires anyway even if they are new. I had one go bad at 795 miles when I tapped a curb and knocked my alignment out.

 

[bdcardinal]

why wasnt the suspension inspected at the time of the alignment? thats step 2 or 3 behind a test drive and checking air pressure and tire wear.

 

[mikey12]

Originally Posted By: bdcardinal
why wasnt the suspension inspected at the time of the alignment? thats step 2 or 3 behind a test drive and checking air pressure and tire wear.


And that there is the root of the problem these days. When work is outsourced to joke outfits that hire people based on the fact they can open a door and spell their name. That is why I am hesitant to take it back because it will just go back to the same place again. I will request the original alignment data that the dealer had performed to see how bad it was before they started to tweak it. I have a feeling that the front axle is at an angle to the rear or the front cross member is bent (which the steering components are bolted to). This has Saginaw style steering. Not many tire shops have people gone to where they drive the vehicle before and after an alignment. Though I have been to one where they practically had the open can of Vaseline on the counter.

 

[Drew2000]

That's a pretty good front end hit. I would take it to a autobody shop with a good frame machine and double-check to see if the frame is square.