Zanorath

So I got my alignment done today, as always, after any shop has touched my car, I washed it. No better way to find issues than having your hands all over it IMO. Anyways, each wheel has 2 scratches on it, each one opposite from the other on the lip edge, very noticeable up close and are about 1 inch wide each, they resemble curb rash. My guess is they attached something to each wheel for the alignment to be done, this was never told to me though. These are not cheap wheels, and are made from anodized aluminum, which I'm told is hard to work with up to impossible to repair without re-doing the entire wheel.

What should I expect them to do for me? These scratches to me are unacceptable and I want nothing more than for things to be back to how they were previous to today, I also feel it would be unreasonable to request $3500 worth of new wheels as a replacement. Has this happened to anyone elses car during alignment or anything similar? If so, what was the outcome?

Thanks.

LEXveryG8

Oh noooo...that's so messed up. I bet the workers knew that happened and was hoping to hide the fact that they did it and hoped you didn't notice. A similar situation happened to my car when I had a new set of tires changed. They had my car on a life and changed all four tires out. By the time they were done, I had a walk around on my car, and I noticed a deep scratch on my bumper(to the point where you can see the metal). I confronted them, and they had on their service sheet that it was already there. I was very pissed off, and they were denying everything.

But, hopefully in your situation it could be better. I would go and have a talk with them. At least they should have them repaired to the original condition at that day.

Drunkebuda

ouch sorry to hear that man mayas got scratched up YIKES.... Thats why before i send my car in for anything done i have the service manager and his manager sign a slip that states there is nothing wrong with my car no scratches, door dings or anything then i can sue their pants off if **** happens.

CK6Speed

iTrader: (1)

When I worked at a dealership I know one of the techs warned my that its possible to scratch the wheel lip. They are careful, but it can happen. Ever since then I always use my stock wheels for alignment. I know some say you should align the car with the wheels you are using, but I personally don't feel the need to, never had a problem using the stock wheels then switching to my aftermarket wheels, and I don't have to worry about any accidental scuffs. Not just scuffs from the alignments machine itself, but by the techs driving the car on the rack or anywhere for that matter.

As for what to do? Doesn't hurt to take the car back and show them the damage.

Zanorath

So I took the car back to the shop to let them see firsthand where the damage was, and thankfully they're going to do the right thing. They were fairly shocked at the damage that the machine did to the wheels, but definitely agreed that their machine was the one that did the damage, and that I wasn't overreacting by wanting them fixed. So they are going to send the wheels off and get them repaired at their cost. Unfortunately my stock wheels have summer tires on them, so we're going to wait until March when the snow/slush/ice/crap is done with.

At least I can sleep now. Sad that I lose sleep over scratch marks on my wheels. Lol

IS3_FTW

iTrader: (3)

^^^Wow, you must have been very respectful, when you went in. Most usually do an outburst and then get denied. Them storm out crying that there going to get a lower. Well, guess what, they never get a lawyer and the company doesnt lose any sleep over it.

BTW, Congrats and where did you get the alignment done at? Obviously it wasnt Lexus LOL

LEXveryG8

Great to hear everything worked out! Nice!

Zanorath

Yeah, I'm not the outburst type, I just let him come to the conclusion that I needed without me stating it. People are typically more open when they can save face and be the "hero" rather than the "defendant". Anyways, it was done at Evergreen AutoWorks in Bothell, came highly recommended and had all sorts of AAA awards for service (which I was hoping in this case would come true). They stated that this is the first time they had seen damage like this, so who knows why it happened, all I can figure is that the lip of my rim is very rounded and didn't give their machine a good edge to grip to, so it made its own.

The alignment itself was pretty much as expected, with the 2IS you can pretty much only correct toe. Since the 2IS comes stock with a visually unbalanced suspension and my coilovers were adjusted to be visually balanced the numbers were not equal across the board, at least that's my guess.

IS3_FTW

iTrader: (3)

I know that the lexus models are hard to align correctly.

Somehow you have to adjust the camber, caster and toe all at the same time. It took a guy, 2 hrs to align my car

Zanorath

That's for the 1IS, the 2IS doesn't have a fully adjustable camber, you can make very tiny tweaks and that's about it.

IS3_FTW

iTrader: (3)

Oh, didnt know that the 2IS was like that.

Yep, tweaks dont do anything for alignments.