How bad is this..........feedback requested
Hi all,
Firstly a sincere thank you, I've never been much of a forum poster, I'm deeply indebted to all those who don't share my affliction, the knowledge I've been able to glean from here has been instrumental in keeping our ZG and JK Rubicon going strongly. Replaced front wheel bearings on the JK last weekend, ordered them from Rockauto the previous Sunday evening, at my door Thursday morning, standard freight! Found out about them on this forum.
The following incident happened to my son and his girlfriend recently, car is a twin turbo Nissan, booked in for rear shock replacement only, they decided to do a wheel alignment as well, forgot to tighten the lock nuts on the adjustable front camber link, car lasted about four hours before suspension collapsed, thankfully at walking pace.
I accept mistakes happen, even really bad ones, I was just grateful at the time nothing really disastrous happened, especially considering they'd almost completed a quick round trip Melbourne/Morwell in the rain.
What happened next is the really alarming part to this little story, the workshop's ridiculously incompetent attempt at repairs and their apparent inability to comprehend the dangers involved, just to save a few dollars.
What followed was two weeks of absolute BULL, both at workshop and management level, head office refusing to escalate beyond state manager level to alleviate stalemate.
The first picture shows the camber link, movement has allowed the threads to work against each other until its just let go.
First solution..........deny threads are stripped, well maybe just the first one or two, and wind adjuster in beyond damaged threads, stating car must have had previous damage that their unable to locate, ignoring the fact that they have apparently successfully conducted a wheel alignment that their now unable to confirm was completed because "it's been lost in the system".
No explanation as to how a car with such an absurd amount of negative camber has four tyres wearing evenly across the entire tread.
Second solution.........as shown in second picture, put washers between mounting bracket and chassis rail! No thanks!
It's been about a week now, they've made two attempts to hand back a car that's clearly not acceptable and probably downright dangerous, management are backing claims of previous damage and want to know why I'm keen to argue over a "shitty little wheel alignment".
By now I've done some research and request camber arm be removed, which revealed an outstanding example of an expert technicians' professional workmanship to the mounting bracket!
I then measure length of camber arm on bench, 165mm. - stock is 178mm. No wonder the wheel is at such a stupid angle. Disassemble camber arm, sure enough, the threads are stripped, only engaged by a few inner threads beyond damaged area.
Next proposed solution..........re-cut damaged threads, Ah..... no thanks!
Management agree to install new camber arms, stating it's a goodwill gesture as the car has previous unidentifiable damage.......real professionals!
Repairs take another week, "we can't locate parts", refuse two requests to install standard components - "we're looking after you, just want you to be happy", then it's Express Post has not arrived, refuse to quote tracking number.........
BULL, BULL,BULL.
Eventually car is returned with wheel alignment print out, so far, so good.
My dilemma is, I'm feeling an increasing sense of responsibility to somehow cause some degree of accountability to be applied to these clowns before something really bad happens to someone less fortunate, however there's no registration/licencing authority to lodge a complaint with, seems they're able to stick a uniform on any moron and advertise him to be a highly trained expert technician.
Am I being overly alarmist?
Your thoughts appreciated.
Cheers
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Black Panther
Dexter
