BMW M4; S1000 RR
Sup boys,
So recently I hit a rock in the road (was having a play with an SQ5 so didn't see it until it was too late) which flattened a bit of the lip on one of my Ph1 alloys. The tyre held it's pressure but then I was driving in a straight line.
Here is the alloy in question:
I got out and made sure the tyre still had pressure, which it did and the car drove absolutely fine afterward. I happened to be on the way to see Mike @ Rentech who said I might want to get the wheel looked at.
Took the car to Kwikfit the next week (was the only place that could fit me in before my trackday at Brands) to get new PS3s fitted to the car.
They called me after I left to sell me a wheel alignment, I said sure - it's never a bad thing.
Collected the car and noticed the wheel was on the piss, pointing left by about 15 degrees when driving straight.
Drove to Brands like that and then dipped out of the sighting laps at 8am to goto Kwikfit in Dartford and have it redone, they showed me the before/after figures were massively different.
I've had it like that for a couple of weeks now and it's largely okay, but the wheel still wasn't dead centre when driving straight so figured I'd take advantage of Kwikfit's 28 day guarantee, just took it back there to the original place this morning. Watched the lad do it, watched him line the steering wheel up and it was pointing straight, he adjusted the toe, commenting that the right wheel (the one that hit the rock) was out.
I took it for a drive, now the wheel is pointing to the right by an equally large measure (probably 1 o'clock when driving straight).
I've left it with them and the manager was suggesting they point the wheel left when aligning it, so that it drives straight... Frankly this concerns me and I'm probably going to ask for a refund regardless of what the car is like when I collect it.
I'm ready for them to turn round and blame it on my suspension components (I naively told them I hit the rock in the road). But the point is, before I took it there the car drove straight, and since taking it back each time - they always seem to think it's been out by a large margin.
My guess would have been they're doing something wrong, at the start of a hunter alignment they need to input ride height measurements, which I can only assume affect the calculations that the computer does to tell you where to point the wheels when making adjustments - he did not enter even numbers for both sides, but then it's not a race car that's been corner weighted so I imagine it's perfectly reasonable that left and right have a slight difference in ride height.
Is it really that hard to make a car point in the same direction as the steering wheel, and more relevantly - is it possible there's something damaged in my suspension components that would make it difficult to align the car?
So recently I hit a rock in the road (was having a play with an SQ5 so didn't see it until it was too late) which flattened a bit of the lip on one of my Ph1 alloys. The tyre held it's pressure but then I was driving in a straight line.
Here is the alloy in question:
I got out and made sure the tyre still had pressure, which it did and the car drove absolutely fine afterward. I happened to be on the way to see Mike @ Rentech who said I might want to get the wheel looked at.
Took the car to Kwikfit the next week (was the only place that could fit me in before my trackday at Brands) to get new PS3s fitted to the car.
They called me after I left to sell me a wheel alignment, I said sure - it's never a bad thing.
Collected the car and noticed the wheel was on the piss, pointing left by about 15 degrees when driving straight.
Drove to Brands like that and then dipped out of the sighting laps at 8am to goto Kwikfit in Dartford and have it redone, they showed me the before/after figures were massively different.
I've had it like that for a couple of weeks now and it's largely okay, but the wheel still wasn't dead centre when driving straight so figured I'd take advantage of Kwikfit's 28 day guarantee, just took it back there to the original place this morning. Watched the lad do it, watched him line the steering wheel up and it was pointing straight, he adjusted the toe, commenting that the right wheel (the one that hit the rock) was out.
I took it for a drive, now the wheel is pointing to the right by an equally large measure (probably 1 o'clock when driving straight).
I've left it with them and the manager was suggesting they point the wheel left when aligning it, so that it drives straight... Frankly this concerns me and I'm probably going to ask for a refund regardless of what the car is like when I collect it.
I'm ready for them to turn round and blame it on my suspension components (I naively told them I hit the rock in the road). But the point is, before I took it there the car drove straight, and since taking it back each time - they always seem to think it's been out by a large margin.
My guess would have been they're doing something wrong, at the start of a hunter alignment they need to input ride height measurements, which I can only assume affect the calculations that the computer does to tell you where to point the wheels when making adjustments - he did not enter even numbers for both sides, but then it's not a race car that's been corner weighted so I imagine it's perfectly reasonable that left and right have a slight difference in ride height.
Is it really that hard to make a car point in the same direction as the steering wheel, and more relevantly - is it possible there's something damaged in my suspension components that would make it difficult to align the car?
