When you say you measured from fender flare to hub center, are you describing doing the alignment yourself? Or was that to achieve precise ride height when tightening the bolts?

I went into the dealership in person today to make the appointment, and they did not seem bothered by it being lifted and modified. So hopefully they are used to it and will be willing to align it for me.

Supposed to snow tomorrow, so I will check the rear lateral links on Wednesday here in the driveway.

 

No, I am describing setting the mechanical end of the ride height - that is establishing the home location for the bushings that are pressed into the arms. They have a metal core surrounded by rubber and that metal core part will be held in place by torque the bolts down. This is common and required practice. One never, ever does finally torque with things hanging in the air, at least for control arms and such. Tie-rods, for example, does not matter because those are ball joints. I dont have the specs handy, but there is a factory set height when doing this from fender edge to hub center. For you or me, we would take that measurement and add the new desired road height, then torque down.

 

Okay thanks, I really appreciate all of your good info! Can't wait to get this thing dialed in and proper. Will definitely report back on what transpires with it next, and how the alignment goes, etc.

 

And I will second getting before/after alignment readings. Because if the shop really could not get it right and you have to pay a dealer to do it.... I would expect some sorta refund of that work.

 

Well after all that, it turned out to be something simple, but incredibly stupid...

I called another LR independent repair shop, called LinDen Automotive in Golden, Colorado, and they referred me to Lakewood Alignment, where they send all of their alignments to. Called them, and they got me in for a same-day while-you-wait appointment on Wednesday. I described my chain of events, and they checked my LR in, and I went into their waiting room to wait. I must say, their shop was incredibly clean with absolutely no clutter, and a very nice layout.

After about 20 minutes, a service writer came into the waiting room, and asked me to come out and look at something under the vehicle. To my surprise, they showed me that the nut on the driver side front tie rod was about ready to fall off, and, shaking the wheel, they displayed the play it was causing in the steering. The tie rod was clunking inside the hole in the knuckle while the wheel moved a good 1/2" to and inch. I took a video as they did this, which I will try to post.

They gave me the disclaimer that if they tighten it up, it could come loose again if the hole in the knuckle has become oblong, and if it does, I will need to replace the knuckle. So they tightened it up, performed the alignment, and after settling up and getting a before and after report, I had my vehicle back and drove down the road to find that it drives perfectly well and good now.

I sent the video to the owner of I.E. Rovers, and he has yet to respond. I also edited my Google review of I.E. Rovers and added the video to reflect that they left the tie rod loose. Cannot stress enough, DO NOT take your vehicle to I.E. Rovers, they are unprofessional, document nothing, don't give estimates or get approval from the customer with documentation and price, and take at least 3 times as long as they say they will to complete the job. They also don't seem to provide much of any warranty, unless they is a catastrophic failure, for which they need to save their own *** from.

I feel silly for not going under the vehicle with a wrench and re-torqueing everything as soon as I felt the problem, but after a month in the shop, I was in a huge rush just to get on the road. But that mistake could have killed me, and my dog, and it is a good reminder that if something doesn't feel right, it is worth it to take the time before driving an unsafe vehicle.

I re-checked the torque on the tie rod ball joint again after getting home, and again after driving it a little bit more yesterday. I will keep checking it, often, as I don't want to have that type of catastrophic failure. If it comes loose, it seems like I.E. Rovers should be responsible for paying for a new knuckle and install, at a different shop. Absolutely never going back there again. Any insight as for avenues to pursue to try and get some of my money back from them would be appreciated, but I won't hold my breath. I am just glad to have my LR3 working properly again.

Thank you for everyone who offered their advice, I really appreciate your time. I am very glad to have found this forum, and look forward to many happy adventures with my LR, as well as increasing my knowledge and handiness at working on it.

EDIT: Can't quite figure out how to link my video, here is the link:

 

Well glad you are safe and glad the issue was found. But that is indeed very disturbing... This is why when I do front end work, I mark everything with a paint pen to indicate that item was torqued to final spec. So I can go over everything again visually to be sure I did it all right. In fact, you see the same marks on new vehicles because they often do the same at the factory. It would make me trust them even less with ANY of the other items you touched. And to recap, this was the same shop that said the SYA kit strut air fittings were defective? Pretty sure they messed those up too based on this find.

 

I am with you, HIGHLY disturbing. And I will go around and check all of the other nuts and bolts too. I already checked the passenger tie rod ball joint, but will go around the whole vehicle. And to confirm, YES, same shop that did the SYA kit. I agree, very likely it was something they messed up that caused the air lines to pop off of their connections immediately after I picked up the vehicle.

I am planning to file an online complaint about them with the BBB. I was in the middle of filing it back in March when they had already kept my LR for 3 weeks and blown past their estimated time to complete the work, but they called while I was in the middle of it and informed me it was complete and ready for pick up.

I like to think I am an understanding customer. I worked in several automotive shops in the past, one was a BMW independent shop, the next was an independent that serviced all makes and models, did brakes and alignments, and happily worked on people's old hot rods. At the latter, I was a service writer, while at the BMW shop I was a mechanic. When I was a service writer, it was my job to quality check all of the cars before they left. I would open the hoods, start the engines, test drive if I felt the need, and give the whole vehicle a parking lot inspection. The mechanics were required to mark the nuts and bolts with a white-out pen, and I could see that everything was properly torqued. It was my job to record in and out mileage, tire pressures, and the status of the malfunction indicator lights on the dashboard when the vehicles arrived and again when they left. We were VERY thorough, and as a result, we had very, very few come-backs. I.E. Rovers does NONE of that. Most of those things are the law in California where I worked, and where I.E. Rovers is located, so it blows my mind that they can operate like this.

 

I want to give a follow-up to this post in case it can be a pathway to solving this issue for anyone in the future, and provide information on the SYA kit.

First off, I did not resolve this myself. It was ultimately fixed by a shop in Longmont, Colorado, called Dynamic Imports. They advertise service for BMW and Volvo, but when I was there with my older 3 series getting new rear subframe bushings, we got to talking about the LR3. I highly recommend this shop if you are in the area. Cool guys, genuine car enthusiasts with some very cool projects in the back, as well as a full paint shop.

I brought my LR3 to Dynamic, and we came up with a plan to replace the original rear airbags and control arms, and re-calibrate the suspension level. They performed this successfully, and the LR3 drove perfectly again, after replacing the terribly worn set of tires which got ruined during my year of alignment woes.

Now for the SYA kit, which is where the timeline of my problems began. Ever since installing the kit, the air lines have been blowing apart and putting me down on the bump stops. I have also put on another 20k miles between Colorado and California, actually had some of the best adventures yet in this vehicle. But it has been extremely inconvenient each time the adventure comes to a halt to fix the air suspension.

The SYA kit brackets, especially in the rear, which I will talk about, make it hard to attach the air lines into the brass fittings on top of the airbags. For some reason, the instructions with the SYA kit are to cut each air line above the airbag, install the SYA spacer on top of the bag, with air line sticking through a hole in the bracket, then re-join the airline to the supply line with a quick connect. These quick connects SUCK. But I finally got them to stop blowing off, with the help of a local shop in California, Topside Performance. THEN, the line began popping out of the brass connections on top of the rear airbags. I was able to fix this myself a few times, which sucked, especially because I was towing when it happened. I brought the LR3 to Topside Performance and the found the SYA spacers on the rear, actually SANDWICH the brass fitting onto the top of the airbag after the spacer is installed. Which would be fine, but since I had my rear airbags replaced after the spacers were installed, the brass fittings securing the airlines to the rear airbags were not able to be tightened properly. I DO NOT fault Dynamic for this AT ALL.

To fix this, Topside removed each rear airbag and drilled out the holes in the SYA spacers to allow the brass fittings to be tightened properly. I was able to drive back to Colorado, towing my trailer and have no problems.

The above describes the fitment/install issues and woes from the SYA kit, now I will describe my impressions of the ride and performance. The ride is not smoother. There is no advantage to the claims that the airbags will be at a similar pressure as they were before lifting the vehicle with johnson rods. It is still harsh over pavement breaks and washboard roads. But the worst is that the rear end actually bottoms out constantly just driving around town. While I am towing, it does not seem to bottom out as easily because the airbags are pumped up for the tongue weight of the trailer.

The only advantage may be found in low range, when the suspension enters extended mode. I have put a lot of miles on the LR3 in low range on very rough, rocky roads in Arizona, Utah and Colorado, and this is where I feel like my suspension is actually performing well.

I can't recommend the SYA kit. I wish I installed coil springs years ago. But I'm too far invested in the air setup now to go to coils, at least for awhile.

The biggest irony, is before the SYA kit my suspension never failed, all the way at 200k miles. After the SYA kit, countless, over a dozen failures, resulting in me on the bump stops every time.

 

The line issues sound more or less like install issues. Even the shop manual says to secure the air line first, then set the air bag into place. Sounds like the airbags were being installed first? Which makes it very hard to do the air lines. Maybe I misreading... Either way, you got it resolved.

If your airbags are shot or not OEM, then a harsh ride will still be an issue. Also you MUST loosen every single control arm bolt when doing a permanent lift otherwise all the bushings are twisted and this will result in a harsh ride. I have a 1.5" GAP lift. No spacers, etc. My front struts I replaced not long ago - went BWI/OEM - the improvement in ride quality was incredible. I have not done rears yet. You should not be bottoming out, that sounds very odd.