alignment followup
 

well, the good news is i got my car back yesterday and the steering wheel alignment is fixed.

but i should explain this. Think of a bicycle, where the handle bars are not perfectly straight relative to the front wheels. What do you do? Hold the front wheel between your knees and twist the handle bars to go straight ahead.

That's essentially what was wrong with the steering wheel apparently.

Now, therefore, if I want to drive perfectly straight, the steering wheel is at the perfect 12 o'clock position.

Good.

But now the bad news: NOW the car pulls to the left almost as though it had a flat tire!! So I took the car BACK to BMW of SD again this morning, and this time SA goes for a drive with me.

Of course, the roads he happens to test it on help offset the effect, so I pointed out that almost any steering corrections he makes are always to the right, and NEVER to the left. Clearly, the car is biased to the left.

He says they'll look at it again, but tried to argue that if it's within spec, then the way it's driving is normal.

So I get a Z4 3.0si loaner car -- WOW VERY IMPRESSED BTW!! -- and lo and behold, NO pulling to the left whatever. I knew I wasn't nuts. :D

Good luck on the Stlr diagnosis, and fix...

You didn't notice this alignment situ when you
test drove it? :confused:

Something is amiss but the sltr may not roll over
for you.
GL,mD

no ........ it seems to be something which gets progressively worse. to wit, i had it aligned 2 weeks ago, and it was fine for a week or so, then started becoming a problem again.

go figure???

anyone know how the X alignment system works? (shims, eccentrics, threaded rods, etc)

that may provide insight as to what caused it to come out so quickly

No detective here, but you had it "aligned 2 weeks ago", it was "fine"
and it's gone to hell in a handbasket...have you been back to the
orig. alignment joint? (Sorry if I've forgotten chapter 1 info.)

What made you get it aligned in the first place? I must be missing
something here. :confused:

C, both your cars having alignment problems? Same shop?

1 car, same alignment shop: BMW of San Diego.

Took it in the first time because the car was pulling left, about 3 weeks ago.

Fixed.

within 2 weeks, noticed that in order to drive perfectly straight, had to keep wheel a few degrees right of center. Took it in yesterday.

Fixed.

As soon as i picked up the car yesterday, car felt like it had a flat, pulls left excessively. Took it back this morning.

Awaiting diagnosis.....

Oh, two threads.

http://www.xoutpost.com/other-bmws/29...out-again.html

Sounds like you may be having two problems. Toe/camber are out of whack. Steering wheel isn't aligned properly.

sorry, i created a 2nd thread because this is a FOLLOWUP ... e.g. it's not the same problem.

agreed.