Ford dealer could not align my lowered MM

[Agent2006]

see before/after sheet from Elkton Ford......was a young guy there...took 2 hrs ...I have to crawl back under the car and see if---

a.SPC camber bolts can move far enough to allow the right setting

b.See if the stops are ground off the frame

---wonder how bad the current settings will chew up the tires? Basically 1.5 camber degree out of spec...

---other option is to go back to stock ride height...truth be told I am not a huge fan of the nose down look 1 1/2" from stock.

Wheel is centered, car rides great, no pulling.

[RubberCtyRauder]

Who put the camber bolts in? Were the slots hand ground in?

[Agent2006]

Good questions

--I don't know who installed them, and I'll have to check those slots. When I was replacing control arms on this beat-to-heck car, camber adjustment was the least of my worries....

[offroadkarter]

That car was align-able before. The reason the car is so ass up raked is because it has full height coils in the back and Ross liked the look ( I never did personally).

I don't think anything was ever wrong with the air ride, you could convert back and adjust the height that way, or do it the cheap way and just cut the coils.

With how much suspension damage that front end took who knows if something is out of whack, but I've driven that car enough times to know it was align-able at one point.

It also looks like they didn't even try to touch the caster, which is what happened when I went to a Ford dealer for an alignment. I ended up going to a shop that was in my hometown I used to frequent and just like with my 04, they got the 03 bang on first try.

[Agent2006]

I saw from Ross's good recording keeping that it was aligned before...and the car still has the tabs on there so I never ground them off. That said, the car tracks straight as an arrow steering centered, i might leave it for now and see how the tires wear. If i do anything itll go back to stock ride height...

[offroadkarter]

Wait, I was pretty sure that car had SPC camber bolts, if it has camber bolts I do not see how can have the camber flags since those are part of the stock bolts.

[Agent2006]

Ridges on the stock crossmember. No tabs. What is surprising is this car was aligned previously and now it can't be done? Need to find another shop....

[justbob]

You don’t grind the ridges, you only grind the slot (that you can’t see if the bolts are installed)


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[offroadkarter]

What is surprising is this car was aligned previously and now it can't be done? Need to find another shop....

Yes. The Ford dealer did not do a good alignment on my car, it shook at 80 and the inner edge on my winter tires got ate in one season. Find another shop that knows how to actually align these, including the caster.

You don’t grind the ridges, you only grind the slot (that you can’t see if the bolts are installed)


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Double yes, I really feel like this has been done already on this car so based on my experiences I'm placing blame on the dealer. If a second shop can't get it right maybe there is an issue.

Ross had a mechanic buddy in central NJ he took the car to anytime he was up here, I'm pretty sure said guy did the camber bolts and I remember him talking about grinding out the slot.