Ryan's Auto Repair, Plymouth - Alignment

I got my car aligned yesterday - night and day difference! I went to Ryan's Auto Repair on Joy Rd. in Plymouth because one of the people from Mazda started working there, Kyle. He co-drives Saitech's autox-prepped Mazdaspeed3, so he's very familiar with the platform and most importantly, he's also a fellow car enthusiast/racer. He previously worked with the alignment guy at Thayer Auto so he's got many years under his belt doing alignments on an older rack - this place has a brand new Hunter rack - clearance is not all that great though, so you may have to bring wood blocks or remove your bumper. I did the latter.

He's the service manager there so he's usually busy with customers during the day. Since he wanted to do the alignment himself, I scheduled a time with him after hours to have his undivided attention. He wanted to align the car with me in it to account for driver's weight, so I sat in the car and held the steering wheel straight while he made adjustments. Ended up with -2.3, -2.4 camber (limits of these KMAC camber plates)... 3.9 caster, toe was around 0.09, 0.1 if I recall correctly. He also designed camber plate for mazdaspeed3's, already drawn up in CAD... hopefully they'll produce them soon and I'll be able to get my hands on a set. I think he and azmath were the ones that designed my new top hats too.

We got to talking and he had a '85 Capri back in the day! (As well as several other fox bodies) So, I'll probably have him do my Capri alignment too whenever that needs to happen... also there's some tuner shops in the same strip mall.. saw a 6-700whp evo owned by one of the store owners... there's a flow/porting place in the strip, flow technologies, that does a bunch of race builds i believe.

The new alignment along with the new top hats that don't bind during steering makes the car feel absolutely amazing! I would highly recommend going here if you want a proper alignment... or any other work done on the car. If I ever upgrade my LSD to a quaife, I wouldn't hesitate to bring it here to do it. If I have any problems with the Mazda this year and can't fix it myself (due to time or out of my capabilities) I would bring it here.

Another thing, he mentioned that he can blueprint engines and stuff if anyone on here goes crazy with a build...

Here's the info:

Ryan's Auto Repair
41990 Joy Rd, Plymouth, MI 48170
(734) 454-0979
ask for kyle tell derrick w/ the ms3 told you about them.

What did the alignment cost?

I was wondering if anyone would do an alignment with you in the car. Seems to make sense as the car doesn't go down the road empty.

If you read my thread about my tire problem, from what Chris was showing me yesterday I have extreme wear on the inner edges of my tires which is usually caused by incorrect toe. The toe was off before the alignment, but not egregiously so. I want to know if the wear I am seeing would be caused by that amount of difference from what it was to mazda spec.

Here is my alignment sheet from a couple months ago. I find it somewhat odd that Mazda's toe range spans from negative to positive. So you can basically choose which you want to run?

Great info Derrick!! Thanks!

he charged me $89.99, amazing price for what he did and the time spent - especially since a std alignment special is $60. I paid ~$100 at thayer last time, had to deal with the stupid service guy and i wasn't in the car. (they also didn't put antiseize on my tie rods last time which made this one take a bit longer)

yeah - i'm not sure how much toe neg or pos we can run on these... but running toe on a street car isn't really recommended, just will eat through tires faster for no real benefit. so he tried to zero it as close as possible.

halo0 wrote:

Here is my alignment sheet from a couple months ago. I find it somewhat odd that Mazda's toe range spans from negative to positive. So you can basically choose which you want to run?

That means they intend for it to be zero.

Wait, did this Kyle used to be parts manager at Thayer? If so I know that guy!

edit: duh, of course it's him. Just talked to him.

So I had an appointment with Kyle this evening. Went in there and of course my car wouldn't go on the rack. Worse yet, they didn't have a jack that would go under my car to lift it so we could remove the bumper. Fail. But then when I was talking to him I mentioned I was supposed to be getting my new tires on tomorrow, and he mentioned that he wanted the new tires on before he did the alignment anyway. So now I am going back next week. They have a guy who is fabricating up some ramps so lowered cars can get on the rack without removing the bumper. Hopefully it will be operational by the time I go back. I'll be bringing my racing jack just in case.

what size DWS did you get?

225/35-19

i hope these provide positive feedback for you

For what Phil plans to do with them they will work fine. They are by no means a "summer performance" tire.

Yeah and I'm going to have to be sure not to forget that. I've become pretty used to the stickiness of these Falkens. Taking a corner at the same speed on the DWS could prove to be an expensive error.

The tread is kinda hard I've found. They maybe alittle more noisy than your falkens.

You haven't heard my Falkens. Seriously, that is not possible.

If you look at the reviews on DT's site you will find many mentions on just the first page about how quiet these are...

I was just sharing my experiences with the tire. I never did hear your falkens, so you would be a better judge of that. I guess when you get them right a review in the tire section.

I can't wait to find out. I am quite disappointed that I have to drive on these stupid things for 4 more days. If we are both at the meet this weekend you should come for a ride so you can hear them yourself!

I wasn't planing on going to the meet but I might have to swing out. My experiences with the DWS's is mostly with normal tire sizes and not plus size applications. So it is hit or miss. I'm really not pleased at all with chris's "professional" opinions on tires.

Josh I'm going to put my response over in my personal thread since we have run this thread way off topic.

Maybe if someone who has admin powers wants they can move this last string of off-topic posts over into my thread as well.

https://obdoneclub.forummotion.com/t20p45-phil-ann-arbor-mazda3-hatch

the only people that have that power is Nick and Alden, sorry Phil im not mod for every section

halo0 wrote:

They have a guy who is fabricating up some ramps so lowered cars can get on the rack without removing the bumper.

haha this is awesome

Crap I forgot to ask Kyle if they were done yet. Tentatively going up there tomorrow night.

thanks for the information. I will get back for more updates/