PSA: Question the sales guy about the scope of work your truck needs before you give them a sale

OP: depending on when you installed the lift you would want the coils to settle a little before alignment anyways, thats not to say you should put 1K miles on the new tires before that happens but you could get tires installed if your lift is already installed, then call the dealership and schedule an appointment to get all seized items replaced / alignment after your trip.

 

I asked the guys at 4 Wheel parts about installing the tires anyway without the alignment and they were in agreement with toytec that I shouldn't do it. I still have probably 700 miles of driving before I'm home. That's what turned this from a minor annoyance into a big hassle, now I have to figure out what to do with this set of 5 tires if I can't get them installed yet. I already cancelled the appointment to have them installed today though so I guess that's out.

 

Call Advanced Automotive in Golden if you need mechanic work or tires done
(303) 278-3704

 

Now I know I'm an idiot, but I had my tires put on with a lift (including TC UCA's) and never got an alignment. Its a bit squirrely, and the tires wear slightly uneven, but I personally think you can live without an alignment for a short time at least.

 

As my Dad used to say "what in thee hell is going on in here"

 

Wait what. Who are you? I’ve never seen you around.

 

Some Tundra dude , in order to be a MOD you can't own a Tacoma or something like that.

 

After getting an estimate from another shop, the cost to fix everything I need fixed just in order to get an alignment is substantially out of my budget for now.

Knowing what I know now, I can't fault the service department for passing on that amount of work, however if any of this had been brought to my attention when I was buying the parts, or when I requested an estimate for an alignment, I would've held off on the purchase, as this additional work literally doubled the cost. To be honest I was expecting more than an hour of labor and expected to pay more like 3-4 hours. But I never could've imagined just to get it aligned, doing the install myself, would be such a substantial amount of work. I think some of the blame for that falls on toytec, since I'm now pretty sure the sales guy didn't even consult with the service department and instead quoted a figure that probably only applies to like-new trucks. (It sounds like seized parts are pretty typical on toyotas.)

Luckily the truck isn't my daily driver. I'll still be able to enjoy my vacation, and it's not a big deal if it's out of alignment while it sits in my driveway. It's a major bummer though considering how much I just spent on tires that I won't even be able to use for a while, when that money should've gone towards getting an alignment. Even more frustrating, the week after I installed the lift, the truck was hit with baseball sized hail that broke the windshield, left some nasty dents, and put a hole in my topper. So you can see how this project is spiraling out of control as I'm pricing out new windshields and fiberglass patching as well. But my frustration was misplaced.

I'm still not happy with Toytec's sales practices, but I apologize for initially placing the blame on their service department. They did what any other shop probably would've done. Although other estimates I got did include some labor and parts $$ on the assumption that there would be *some* seized parts, my truck is worse than average and needs a lot of stuff replaced. So it looks like I'm gonna be learning a lot about steering components and seeing if some of this is stuff I can handle myself. Probably gonna be making some new threads asking some stupid questions in the near future.

Thanks everybody for your input. Now I'm off to enjoy the rest of my vacation.