After installing suspension and lowering the 325i, I scheduled an appointment at Cooley/Mazda to have the following done:
- tie rods replaced
- four wheel alignment
- four tires mounted and balanced
Car was dropped off at 8:30 AM with the understanding that work could be completed for a pickup around 4 PM, as I needed the car the next day. I was good with this and left the car and stuff I wanted installed.
I was called by the service manager at around 3 PM and told things were busy and asked how late could I pick it up. He said they were busy as a couple techs didn’t show up but said it would get done that day. I was told that the tech was just about to start the work at that time. I said I could pick up at 6-6:30 if that would allow them enough time to finish the work. Service manager said that was good.
5 PM, I get a VM from the service manager (as I was in a meeting and couldn’t pick up). He left a message saying only the tie rods could be done that day and there was no time to do other stuff. I called Cooley back to find out that the service manager had gone home, and the tech had gone home by 5:05 PM.
All that was done on the car were the tie rods, nothing else. I was initially charged approximately $300 for installation of two tie rods. I explained that the tech was not working for 3 hrs on it but the cashier / other service manager wouldn’t listen and said that was standard book time. Eventually the tech called in and got it down to half that.
All in all, car was there for over 9 hours and I spent $150 on having tie rods installed. Wheel alignment was not completed, and neither was the wheel mounting / balancing. The tech offered to do it the next day, but the car was there a whole day already and it wasn’t completed so I just took everything home with me and looked for another place.
In the end, I went to Cap Cities BMW and got an alignment through Brad K, which I was very happy with. Bill Mcdowell I believe was the guy who did the work…
At Cap Cities, I left the car in the morning, and picked it up by 1 PM, no issues and alignment was very close to the custom specs I wanted. You can see in the bottom half of this post where things ended up on the alignment:
http://shift518.gom-host.com/showpost.php?p=431464&postcount=112
I inquired at Watkins Spring and basically their alignment cost almost as much as the Cap Cities one, so in the end I decided to go with Cap Cities for the difference so I have no experience with Watkins Spring.