MA Right to repair question 1 (2025)

calsdad said:

Yeah well - that's totally true. Seems like every other time I bring one of my vehicles to some place to get work done- they phuck it up. My wife has been bringing her car to Lexus of Manchester - and they've been pretty good actually , but still - after one of the services I found (months later) - that they hadn't put most of the plastic hold down pins back into the plastic covers in the engine compartment. So we're going down the highway and there's this strange flapping noise coming from somewhere on the car ... I keep stopping and trying to figure out what it is and can't figure it out. Then a week or so later I'm checking the oil or filling the washer bottle or whatever I notice all the damn hold down pin thingies are gone.

WTF.

I've had my truck aligned twice - and they still can't get it right. Both times it comes back with the steering wheel off center and still has a pull to the left. Again - WTF.

Right now - I need to do some front end work on the truck - and my wife's Lexus is getting close to 200K and definitely needs suspension work... .it's starting to wander a lot on the highway and shit like that. The Lexus dealer already said they couldn't align it a couple of years back - because the rear adjustment points are too rusted up. Then they gave a quote to do all the rear suspension work that was like $3500. I looked up what all the parts would cost - using either OEM or high end aftermarket (MOOG) - and the cost for parts was going to be like $850 or something like that. So long story short - I'm wondering where the hell I'm gonna go to get both cars aligned after I finish doing the work - because neither place I've used before - really seemed to know WTF they were doing.

Which - I discovered - was really egregious, because I ended up buying an older Hunter alignment machine after seeing a really good deal on Facebook and started delving into figuring out the system and trying to get it up and fully functional. So apparently the newer systems seem almost moron proof - in that they'll align the steering wheel straight and they do a step by step on how to do all the adjustments on the vehicle, do a thrust line adjustment ( to eliminate pulling) etc.

So why the hell the idiots who aligned my truck the last two times couldn't do this shit - especially after one of them bragged about their "brand new alignment machine setup" - is beyond me.

Whatever. Like with most things - I'll figure it out and do it myself.

To my way of thinking - the absolute worst part of all this repair lockdown shit on the part of the manufacturers - is that it puts you at the mercy of a bunch of people who - in my experience , are phucking incompetents and cheaters - and in some cases just phucking moronic. I've worked with some really good mechanics - and stuck with them once I found them. But in most cases it was a relationship that ended once we got rid of that particular brand of car (had a really good Volkswagen mechanic we used a bunch of times - but then we got sick of the Volkswagen and he was a specialist).

Click to expand...

What year truck ? Was the electronic steering reset if equipped ?
How are the tires.
Do you have a print out.
Does it always pull left or is it prone to do so on certain roads. Also is it a pull or a drift .
Dealers will put a jig on the wheel and measure correction by weight. More often they will pass this test.

As for rotted/frozen suspension/adjustment points. Toyota/lexus are horrible for this frozen by year 4 !
All though many are well with in spec to not bother adjusting. Usually the rear strut/springs are clapped out and camber is off