Rear Wheel Toe-In on 2008

So I'm wondering, would this bear any relationship to my issue? I bought my '07 Touring because I wanted what I assumed would be better handling. Unfortunately, I've had constant problems with alignment & handling.

Shortly after I bought the car, I felt it pulling and had it realigned. Since then, it seemed that the handling was worse (I'll explain in a minute), but it wasn't pulling any longer. I took it back in a month later and they said the alignment was in spec, but they noticed that the left side was 1/2" lower than the right. Unfortunately, I didn't know what to do about that and they indicated that it was not a problem.

Since then, I've particularly noticed that I seem to get excessive body roll and tire scrubbing when I turn right (at a fairly quick pace), but turning left results in quick and accurate turn-in and tracking with minimal body roll. Just recently, I've had passengers in the car (normally it is just me) and experienced the car bottoming out when turning into a driveway. Taken at a crawl with a very small and short incline/slope at the driveway entryway results in the left rear scraping its bottom.

And that was with a total load of 650 lbs of driver and passengers and no other cargo. So finally, I realized that all of these issues must be related to the 1/2" lower left side. I have the car at the dealer right now and they're thinking about what to do. Twice they've been ready to say there's nothing they can do, and twice they've said they'll see if there's something they can do.

Today they said they need to align it, but they can't do it under warranty since I've already had that done once. I said that they've supposedly checked the warranty 3 times since the first alignment and told me it's fine each time, yet I continue to have handling problems. They agreed to check the alignment and said it's off - imagine that. They also said my steering wheel is off-center. I suspected that was the case also, but couldn't convince them of that earlier.

So... before I give up and take the car to a specialty shop, any thoughts/ideas?

 

I know that the service manual wants the tech to verify the vehicle height prior to performing an alignment, but doesn't tell you how to adjust the ride height if it isn't correct.

 

So last Monday I was driving on I95. I had known my 07 pulls to the left (though this behavior isn't influenced when I brake) but I thought it was tolerable. It must be that the local potholes made the car worse.

So do you think that NTB would be the right place to go for an alignment?

I'm looking to go soon so if you have any ideas/hints that would predict whether the specialist knows what they are doing I would appreciate it.

I've read through the 2007 thread already.

 

Try to find a technician who understands the concept of toe readings in degrees and can manipulate the software to give you this data. It will make it much easier to determine shim thickness and it will be a more precise measurement than fractional inches. I was unable to find a shop that could do this in the Sacramento area; the best I could do was get them to print decimal inches and convert it myself.

 

dogfriend I read about your problems and was going to ask specifically for that.

I was going to go to a Mr Tire or NTB and was wondering if anyone had any other ideas.

 

Hey guys,

I just got my alignment done at Firestone and my rear left toe is out of spec at 0.43 (spec: .03-0.28). My toe was never out of spec before and I have lifetime alignments. I'm not too worried because something tells me that the computer spits out something different every time.

I'd like to wait a few more thousand miles to see the results of a couple more alignments. Is this ok to wait on? Thanks!

 

There is some variation in readings due to setup and also variation due to the resolution of the equipment, but 0.43° is out of spec by quite a bit - about the same as mine before I corrected with shims.

If you are ok with the handling (I wasn't) and increased tire wear, then you can wait awhile.

 

I've never noticed a problem with handling. Tire wear: I get rotations ever 5k miles so it's hard to keep track, but nothing out of the ordinary there either.

Yeah I think I may wait a while before I go to a custom alignment place. I'm also wondering if it looks odd. Like when I'm driving, does my wheel spin funny? I used my driver side mirror to get a good look but couldn't really tell lol. ...I see cars like this on the freeway and I think it looks horrible.

 

Pretty difficult to see 0.2° by eye - that is why they make the sophisticated alignment equipment to measure it.