I have a 2012 Camaro with 240,000 miles. It still has the original suspension. Currently, my front tires are wearing heavily on the inside tread. Should I pay to get an alignment done, and probably have them tell me that my tie rods are shot and possibly other components? Or should I go ahead and replace the tie rods and possibly the coil overs myself, and then get the alignment since it would need one after that anyway? I am fairly certain that I can do the replacement myself as I am not unfamiliar with working on my car. I just don’t know how to tell if the components need replacement. I am torn and need some input. Thoughts?
Bring it in for the alignment. And if they find it can’t be aligned because of worn steering/suspension components, they’ll take it off the rack and give you a list of the worn components.
Tester
3 Likes
I’m going to be blunt here . . .
With 240K miles, you probably need everything . . . shocks/struts, control arms, ball joints, tie rod ends and maybe more than that
I seriously doubt your car is in good enough shape to do an alignment without having a bunch of stuff replaced first
Since you’re familiar with working on your own car, how about you put it on jack stands, slide under the car on a creeper and check out the entire suspension and steering. Use a pry bar . . . you might be surprised how sloppy and worn out some things are
have you at least performed the bounce test to see just how bad your shocks/struts are?
8 Likes
Just be prepared to pay for that service…probably about half of what the charge for the alignment would have been.
Don’t forget about those GM hub bearings…
Either jack it up and shake down the front end to see what all is loose, do it again after everything you think is loose is replaced cause you probably missed something… lol
Or take it to a shop that does suspension work and ask to have it checked out…
Don’t forget about your rear multi link suspension also, lots of fun stuff to wear out and replace back there too…