Small towns suck

"Small towns suck"

Sorry I can't help you with the alignment measurements, but I guess I'm not connecting the dots... why is this the town's fault?

Here's a good article about getting your alignment "close" at home. This is more or less what I did, but I eventually had the thing professionally aligned.

At-Home Alignment Made Easy

did you book an appointment or just drop it off. I work in a shop and I know we are usually booked 2 weeks but sometimes we work on drop off's when we are caught up.

striker911 said:

I dropped my car off at the shop just to get the toe adjusted cause I put a new rack on it. Its not off that bad and I know how to adjust it myself so I am going to get it tomorrow done or not. 4 days is just bs.

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What did you expect them to do? Drop everything that they had scheduled and work on your car? I've had appointment books booked for two weeks solid...

striker911 said:

The way I have done it in the past is to just put screws in the tread and use a tape measure. What I need to know is has anyone done this on a fox and how far should the toe in be? I would think a 1/4" or less but im not sure on exact measurements.

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Better make sure that companies like Hunter don't find out about your skill. If you think you can set toe as accurate as a machine with Win Toe, you're setting on a gold mine. Even if you just replace one tie rod end, count the number of turns, and check the alignment before and after, you're still going to be way off.

NikwoaC said:

Here's a good article about getting your alignment "close" at home. This is more or less what I did, but I eventually had the thing professionally aligned.

At-Home Alignment Made Easy

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I've done it that way as well, but only when I had to work on something on the side of the road (IE tie rod separated) , and get it close enough to get it back to the shop.

Here's a tool that is a little more accurate. We used to have one at a place I worked, but I have no idea how good it is.

http://www.tooltopia.com/tool-aid-61800.aspx

Mustang5L5 said:

I've done it myself before. Wasn't too hard. been 2 years and no issues with abnormal wear.

I refused to let anyone drive my car at an alignment place, so that kinda forced me to do it myself

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I have to agree with you on that. The tire shops tend to have less than skilled workers. You can probably get it close enough to get the steering wheel centered, and no abnormal wear. I'd rather buy front tires all the time if need be, than trust someone else touch it. lol

I was living in L.A. for a short time. I didn't have the space to do something like change oil, so that was one of the very, very few times I let someone else work on my car (my Crown Vic). I made an appointment. It really should have taken then 30 minutes, but I timed them, and it took an hour. I really didn't care, I didn't have anything else to do that day. When I went to pay my bill, they tried to upsell me almost $2,700 worth of stuff. Three of the things that they said I needed were spark plugs and boots, fuel filter, and a belt. Funny. I replaced ALL of those 1500 miles ago before I left Omaha! I was pretty angry about that to begin with not just because I didn't need any of that crap, but because there wasn't any indication that they were bad. On the report it said "based on mileage". What a load of crap. The next day, exactly 22 hours later, my lower radiator hose burst! From the outside, you could see a 1/4" incision. Inspecting it from the inside, it does actually look like it might have rubbed through from the oil cooler. This is the first time I have seen anything like that. Even if it wasnt their fault, it seems quite suspicious.

Yeah, I agree. Unless it's tearing into the dash to find electrical problems or overhauling an auto trans, I just do it myself. I've had people at the ford dealership screw my cars up. Pathetic. The last straw that made me this way was like above, in a lube shop. Got an oil change and a tranny fluid/filter change and jackazz under the truck breaks out the 1/2 drive impact to put the trans pan bolts back in...Man I hit the roof!

Oh, and I just moved-out in the woods near a small town, and I love it. no traffic, people wave when you drive past, not a bunch of bass booming morons keeping me up all night.... Small town FTW!

I agree with a few posts above.... you will never beat a new hunter alignment rack with win tow.I use one every day and it is so accurate

I live on the North side of Indy, and I had to SEARCH to find a shop capable of aligning a front suspension with aftermarket CC plates. I actually had one shop recommend me to another shop, haha. In the end, the shop that did it had a Hunter machine, and they gave me a printout that showed the factory specs and how close they got it to those. Pretty good place, I'd go there again.

Mustang5L5 said:

I've done it myself before. Wasn't too hard. been 2 years and no issues with abnormal wear.

I refused to let anyone drive my car at an alignment place, so that kinda forced me to do it myself

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totally agree with this. when i was 17 years old i had my first foxbody. it was super flashy with my tear away paint, 331 stroker, blah blah. dude says i can't drive it on the rack for liability reasons. the dude tried to keep my car at a standstill halfway up the ramps by using only my clutch. i started seeing smoke rolling out of my bellhousing, i had no fork cover. i ran over and started screaming at him. he apologized and asked me to pull it on

i have a guy now at sears of all places, who is the only guy i let drive my car. i went there on reference to him. he asked me the first time he sat in it, what tricks do i need to know? i told him about the t5 reverse shifting and its touchy, he drove it just fine.

anyways, sucks about the shop dude. i know it sucks watching people touching your child. try and do it yourself for everything is all you can do.

SSeater said:

Got an oil change and a tranny fluid/filter change and jackazz under the truck breaks out the 1/2 drive impact to put the trans pan bolts back in...Man I hit the roof!

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Unless if he broke something, you shouldn't have complained. Who cares what he used to put the bolts in? Just about any experienced mechanic with 20, 30, or 40 years of experience would have done the same thing! Odds are he had a 1/2" impact handy, and decided to use it rather than go back to his toolbox for a wrench or ratchet. Odds are that he wasn't jackhammering on it. Believe it or not, but impact have torque settings, and most of them have progressive trigger. If you use the same tool day in and day out for years, you tend to learn what it is capable of.

Over the years I've had customers complain about the dumbest things. I'd like to know what gives people the opinion that they can harass someone when they're trying to work. Far too many people end up in the back of the shop despite "Employees Only" signs being everywhere. There are the people that want to BS with me while I'm trying to work on their car. There are also people that want to "help" but only end up getting in my way. There are people that want me to show them what I'm doing so they can do it the next time. THEN there people that want to tell me how I'm doing things wrong. Really, if you take it to me to work on, that's telling me that you lack the ability to do the job. In other words, let me do my job, k? I've had far too many people walk in the service area, and act like I ****ing owe them something. To paraphrase Rodney Carrington "I don't go to where you work and throw rocks at you while you're mowing".

Working at a shop isn't anything like working on your own vehicle. Odds are he got paid an hour for both jobs. He's probably working on flat rate and trying to do his job efficiently so he can make money, and you can be on your way. It's not like he had all day to work on it.

I could go on and on about stupid stuff that customers complain about.

giddyup306 said:

I could go on and on about stupid stuff that customers complain about.

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I can completely understand what you're saying, but for every one good mechanic there are 10 high school drop out jackasses spinning wrenches at the local quick lube. If I had a nickel for every time I saw one of these "technicians" screw something up or attempt to sell something to a customer that they didn't need, I would have a much bigger budget for Mustang parts.

YOU may be a good mechanic who knows his way around an impact wrench, but I wouldn't be speaking for all the potential idiots out there, ifyouknowwhatImean.

Mustang5L5 said:

I've done it myself before. Wasn't too hard. been 2 years and no issues with abnormal wear.

I refused to let anyone drive my car at an alignment place, so that kinda forced me to do it myself

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haha I remember once, I got my first Fox aligned. Went to the shop, looked around in the employee's parking and all I saw were hondas with the typical wings and big exhaust tips... When the guy asked for the keys, I said "I drive it in onto the ramp and I DRIVE for the test drive, your mechanic can ride in the passenger seat if he wants"

I had to explain what the C/C plates were and what the bump-steer was to the shop that did mine.....but found a great shop after the fact who knows what they are doing...they will be doing the alignment when the new rack goes in...

Love small towns. Live in a small town. Also have respect for techs who know what they are doing. Do research and take your car to someone you trust, then let them do their jobs. If you take it to the cheepest place around, most of the time you get what you pay for.

giddyup306 said:

Unless if he broke something, you shouldn't have complained. Who cares what he used to put the bolts in? Just about any experienced mechanic with 20, 30, or 40 years of experience would have done the same thing! Odds are he had a 1/2" impact handy, and decided to use it rather than go back to his toolbox for a wrench or ratchet. Odds are that he wasn't jackhammering on it. Believe it or not, but impact have torque settings, and most of them have progressive trigger. If you use the same tool day in and day out for years, you tend to learn what it is capable of.

Over the years I've had customers complain about the dumbest things. I'd like to know what gives people the opinion that they can harass someone when they're trying to work. Far too many people end up in the back of the shop despite "Employees Only" signs being everywhere. There are the people that want to BS with me while I'm trying to work on their car. There are also people that want to "help" but only end up getting in my way. There are people that want me to show them what I'm doing so they can do it the next time. THEN there people that want to tell me how I'm doing things wrong. Really, if you take it to me to work on, that's telling me that you lack the ability to do the job. In other words, let me do my job, k? I've had far too many people walk in the service area, and act like I ****ing owe them something. To paraphrase Rodney Carrington "I don't go to where you work and throw rocks at you while you're mowing".

Working at a shop isn't anything like working on your own vehicle. Odds are he got paid an hour for both jobs. He's probably working on flat rate and trying to do his job efficiently so he can make money, and you can be on your way. It's not like he had all day to work on it.

I could go on and on about stupid stuff that customers complain about.

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An air ratchet I would have been ok with, but not an impact the way this j.a. was using it. Yes, he was hammering on it, and I watched him through the window of the office, not from the shop. Yes, he was an idiot, yes he needed to be fired. Trust me, if you'd seen this you would have slapped this guy in the back of the head.