Allignment shop for lifted van?

[Buliwyf]

I'll gladly do professional alignments. Way easier than my day job. My fee is $50 an hour.

That's why you can't get a quality alignment. People aren't willing to pay $127 per hour for it.

 

[Regcabguy]

If you live in the San Diego area I'm sure Agile Offroad can take care of it or refer you..
They do some quality work.

 

[Justgosurfin]

I’m in south florida and the shop I found is “front end performance”. I’ll report back and also post all the pics and notes from the kit install in my thread later in the week

 

[XJINTX]

I have lifetime allignment at Firestone for the van. It are they just gonna scratch there heads when I show up next week?im more concerned with them not knowing how to properly do the job than whether or not I have to pay extra.

Should I try to find a specialty lift shop?

Thanks

Don't see your location but from handle I'd guess CA? Sorry, if not, but here in Southwest we have shops called Southern Tire mart. I had never used them as I thought they were only for Commercial trucks. I have Jeep, Tacoma and F250 that I now take to them. They seem to have the knowledge, equipment and experience with trucks and over sized vehicles. My Jeep was never aligned properly until now. That said maybe you have some sort of "Truck Shop" local too that you have overlooked?

 

[Justgosurfin]

I’m in Fort Lauderdale FL, hopefully for not too too much longer as I need to get back to the mountains again.

Kyle at Front End Perfomance did a great job on Saturday. The van tracks super straight now but not it’s about a turn and 1/4 to lock going right and a turn and 1/2 going left. I’m wondering if the new steering gear box I put in during all of this now uses the 12-6 pitman arm? Although the 10-2 seemed to go on properly I was so certainly it was correct that I didn’t think twice about it. Will have a look after work.

 

[Bikersmurf]

I'll gladly do professional alignments. Way easier than my day job. My fee is $50 an hour.

That's why you can't get a quality alignment. People aren't willing to pay $127 per hour for it.

$127 an hour would be way less than I had to pay... and I ended up disputing the bill and getting it reduced a bit.

 

[jblaze5779]

Took me two years to find a shop with an old man that knew exactly what he was doing. My van drives great now. Those chain tire places don't know they're ass from a hole in the ground if they can't punch it in the computer.

 

[cynicwanderer]

I upgraded my springs and bought some Moog alignment bushings that can do both caster/camber independently, knowing that it would exceed the standard available bushing range. my shop refused to install them, claiming that it was their policy not to install customer supplied parts. the tech that actually tried to do the alignment said that the shop only allows them to use max. of 2.5deg bushing, and that it was not enough to bring the caster to within spec on my setup. needless to say, I'm going to find a new shop, or figure out how to do it myself.

doing some research, most shops align caster around 3deg on these vans (no doubt some happy OEM service recommendation) but closer to 5deg is actually needed in order to minimize bump steering on the 2WD ford vans, when everything else is in good shape. I'm less than 3deg and it's still a bit twitchy. I'm going to figure out how to measure caster and then install the Moog bushings and adjust above 3deg, and then fine tune it to see where it's happy.

 

[winmag4582001]

Sounds like you need to find a shop that actually specializes in alignments still.
The shop I take my vans to tells me to install the double adjust pills because if they have to do it they'll change me $60 a piece for them.

 

[CaptainBuilt]

I took mine to a shop that does mostly commercial stuff too. They were fast (same day) and cheap! $73 out the door. AND they had a UJOR van of their own. Drives like a dream now.,

 

[Bikersmurf]

I took mine to a shop that does mostly commercial stuff too. They were fast (same day) and cheap! $73 out the door. AND they had a UJOR van of their own. Drives like a dream now.,

I feel like I got fleeced... I think I paid $270 after arguing with the manager to get the price reduced and it still needed a bushing changed again.

 

[Raul]

WHY IS THIS SO HARD?!

I've been looking for a shop to do my alignment. Firestone and several small shops didn't want to deal with a converted 4x4 van. Finally I found a shop next to a place that sell " Truck Accessories, Guns and Ammo". They lift truck, put big wheels...and they use the shop next door to do alignments. Great, right? wrong.
They were unable to correct my front left camber. OK, it is what it is.
My steering wheel was 45 deg. off. No big deal, I can adjust it easily. So I got to it and something called my attention:



The adjusting cam is popping up, but this is not the worst:

the nut is not even torqued up . This is not only a sign of incompetency, but it is plain Dangerous.

Just for your info, these are the alignment values. After seen that I was not dramatically off even though I just eyeball it without doing any measurements, I probably am more qualified to do this the professional shop.

 

[Justgosurfin]

WHY IS THIS SO HARD?!

I've been looking for a shop to do my alignment. Firestone and several small shops didn't want to deal with a converted 4x4 van. Finally I found a shop next to a place that sell " Truck Accessories, Guns and Ammo". They lift truck, put big wheels...and they use the shop next door to do alignments. Great, right? wrong.
They were unable to correct my front left camber. OK, it is what it is.
My steering wheel was 45 deg. off. No big deal, I can adjust it easily. So I got to it and something called my attention:

View attachment 482499

The adjusting cam is popping up, but this is not the worst:
View attachment 482500
the nut is not even torqued up . This is not only a sign of incompetency, but it is plain Dangerous.

Just for your info, these are the alignment values. After seen that I was not dramatically off even though I just eyeball it without doing any measurements, I probably am more qualified to do this the professional shop.

View attachment 482501

Holy moly!

 

[Justgosurfin]

This can’t be good. Not sure how this ball joint at the pitman arm / drag link connection got ruined already? Has anyone had a bad moog from the factory?

My steering was super sloppy and I chalked it up to a crappy remanned gearbox but when I looked underneath with a friend turning the wheel, the stud moves like a worn out joint does. I then removed the pin went to tighten the nut and it just spins super easily. The nut unthreads fine but spins with the nut upon tightening beyond maybe 25 ft lbs. it calls for 67.

Has anyone experienced this? Going to replace that end this weekend when I find the part number.

 

[Raul]

It looks like you have a miss-match taper.

The pit arm for a converted 4x4 van is replaced with one with a different tapered ID for the F350 drag link. I got mine from UJOR. did you replaced/ modified yours?