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The Shop San Bruno - New Hunter in ground alignment rack

MikeC_587

MikeC_587

Experienced Member
Joined
12 June 2003
Messages
1,635
Location
Bay Area
In Sept 2012, Matthel Ma (aka Matt) owner of The Shop San Bruno, decided to replace his above ground Hunter Alignment rack with an in ground Hunter Alignment rack. One of the advantages of the in ground Hunter alignment rack is that it will accommodate almost any lowered car. Recently, I thought it would be a good idea to have an alignment done on my NSX. Some of you may know that my NSX is relatively low with KW Variant 3 coil overs and Umbrella Design front cup kit.

In spite of how low my NSX is, my NSX had no problem driving onto the alignment rack. As a side note, I did notice that the technician (Caleb) with the assistance of the other technician (Mike), took extra precautions while driving my NSX onto the alignment rack.

After mounting the devices on to all four wheels, a snap shot of what my current alignment specs were taken. Caleb, reviewed the current specs with me and provided advice on what could be done based on my requirements.

The adjustments that can be made on an NSX are typically:

1) Front and rear camber
2) Front and rear toe
3) Front caster


Below are several pics that was taken during my alignment.

Hunter Alignment Specs for stock NSX


Before


After


Caleb - Technician


Pic 1 NSX on Alignment Rack


Pic 2 NSX on Alignment Rack


I was very satisfied with the work done by the Technicians at The Shop San Bruno and I highly recommend them for alignment not only for your NSX, but for all your other cars as well.

To make an appointment you can reach Matt at (650) 624-SHOP (7467), their address is:

The Shop San Bruno
1153 San Mateo Ave
San Bruno, California 94066

The Shop San Bruno is also on Facebook, look for The Shop San Bruno

Thanks,

Mike
 
Coupe months ago, I went there for my NSX alignment and they messed up the rear toe. I have to argue with Matt for an hour for them to redo the job. I will never go back there again because of Matt's attitude. We know nsx alignment is little different from other cars. So I tried to provide them with instructions that I downloaded from nsxprime but they insisted that they don't need it cause they done a lot of nsx alignments. But it turns out they don't know nsx alignment. May be they do know how to do nsx alignment now because I taught them.
 
Hello this is Matt from The Shop. Id like to explain my side of the story and clarify a few things.

soyeah81 came in for a regular alignment and showed me some pictures on how to do it. I told him that it shouldn't be a problem because we have done plenty of NSX alignments before. After the alignment was finished he claimed we did not do it right because the arrows on the rear toe adjustments did not line up. I said we adjusted the rear toe that's why it did not line up, after a short discussion(approx 5-10 min, not even close to 1 hour) I agreed to realign it after we finished another car that was on the alignment rack already.
During our discussion, He said if I ask any NSX owner they would know what he is talking about. I had 1 NSX there at the time and he went to ask that NSX owner and he did not know what soyeah81 was referring to. Shortly after, a different friend of mine dropped off his NSX for an alignment. Before he was able get out of his vehicle, soyeah81 literally went up to him and started asking him numerous questions. My friend simply said "I don't know, I just drop the car off and have Matt align the car". soyeah81 even approached my technician after he finished the other car alignment and stated "you sure you aligned that correctly?" in my opinion this comment was unnecessary.

Lastly, I am sorry that soyeah81 is unhappy with his alignment, I thought we had made things right when we aligned it for him again to his liking. I am also sorry that he thinks I have an attitude. I never felt that I was giving him attitude but I will take that as constructive criticism. We've been doing NSX alignments for years, so no we did not learn how to do our alignments from soyeah81.
 
^^ Fair enough I think


I've never been to this shop but Mike C is a very well known and very well respected member of Prime and the NSX community and if he endorses the shop that's good enough for me.
 
The in ground aligment rack is pretty cool.
Thanks Mike for the info.
Your ride should be handling much better now.
 
Last edited:
What 5 to 10 minutes? That's not even enough for me to talk Matt and his friend (the white NSX owner) and try to show Matt the other Black NSX's rear toe that just came into the shop. Clearly Matt is lying here.

Roger,

"^^ Fair enough"???

Matt didn't tell you guys how he tried to redo my rear toe. He lifted up my car on a regular rack and try to twist the outer toe link to align with the inner toe link. This is really piss me off. He definitely think I am stupid. Adjust the alignment without on the alignment rack? I told him don't touch my alignment unless it is on the alignment rack. Here is another 20 minutes argument.

If they knew the proper way of doing NSX alignment, he should agree with the instruction that I showed him the first place without having me to talk to his white NSX owner friend. How can you say you know the NSX alignment when you disagree with the NSXPRIME instruction?

Any NSX owner here, if you have done the alignment from The Shop, you should check your rear toe. If the arrow on the outer toe link doesn't align with the inner toe link, take it back have them redo the job.
 
Last edited:
soyeah81 said:
What 5 to 10 minutes? That's not even enough for me to talk Matt and his friend (the white NSX owner) and try to show Matt the other Black NSX's rear toe that just came into the shop. Clearly Matt is lying here.

Roger,

"^^ Fair enough"???

Matt didn't tell you guys how he tried to redo my rear toe. He lifted up my car on a regular rack and try to twist the outer toe link to align with the inner toe link. This is really piss me off. He definitely think I am stupid. Adjust the alignment without on the alignment rack? I told him don't touch my alignment unless it is on the alignment rack. Here is another 20 minutes argument.

If they knew the proper way of doing NSX alignment, he should agree with the instruction that I showed him the first place without having me to talk to his white NSX owner friend. How can you say you know the NSX alignment when you disagree with the NSXPRIME instruction?

Any NSX owner here, if you have done the alignment from The Shop, you should check your rear toe. If the arrow on the outer toe link doesn't align with the inner toe link, take it back have them redo the job.
Click to expand...


First of all to answer your reply to my post that you taught Matt and his team how to do alignments, couldn't be farther from the truth, because I have had my NSX aligned by The Shop many times when they had the above ground Hunter Alignment rack.

Secondly, its not clear that Matt is lying.

Thirdly, I know many of Matt's customers some who track their cars. some that are daily drivers and some that are garage queens and they all have their alignments done at The Shop.

Fourthly, let's just chalk this up to experience and that you already made it clear that you will never go back to The Shop for any service or alignment ever again.

Fifthly, why don't you find a shop that you can recommend for an alignment or open up your own alignment shop, since based on your two posts, you're clearly an expert.

Sixthly, the end.

Mike
 
Mike,

Have you inspect the alignment job after they did it other than looking at the final result on the paper? The paper doesn't prove they did it right. They did my NSX alignment, the paper show green for the rear toe when they miss align the arrows. But after I complained they align the arrows and it is also green. So the paper result doesn't always tell the truth.

I am not here to make you to believe. Apparently you are bias. I am just sharing my experience at The Shop San Bruno here. I don't think you can defend them since you were not there that day. You have no idea what happened. Also, I am not an expert, I am just happen to have an instruction to show the mechanic to do the right job.
 
Last edited:
I've had all of my cars aligned and serviced at The Shop San Bruno and I've never experienced any issues with their work. They are clean, thorough, and very customer-service oriented. I was there that day and in all honesty, the argument lasted no longer than 10 minutes. The owner of the red Nsx, I feel, was being unreasonable with his attitude and Matt was being as professional as possible to accommodate him. I recall Matt trying to formulate a solution with the owner, and the owner continuously laughing in his face and constantly belittling the mechanics there.

I've never had a single problem with any of the alignments performed on my car, including multiple alignments done on my Nsx due to height changes and wheel swaps. Even til now, I've never seen a single post here on prime regarding a "proper" Nsx alignment with the arrows pointing at each other. Either way, I'm going to continue bringing all of my vehicles to The Shop San Bruno because of their friendliness, accommodations, and their capability to perform mechanical and diagnostic work on my cars.

Another +1 here for all of my experiences there. Plus! The new in ground alignment rack works amazing for lowered vehicles. Virtually no chance of damaging your front lips and rear diffusers. :)
 
WashabiS2K said:
I've had all of my cars aligned and serviced at The Shop San Bruno and I've never experienced any issues with their work. They are clean, thorough, and very customer-service oriented. I was there that day and in all honesty, the argument lasted no longer than 10 minutes. The owner of the red Nsx, I feel, was being unreasonable with his attitude and Matt was being as professional as possible to accommodate him. I recall Matt trying to formulate a solution with the owner, and the owner continuously laughing in his face and constantly belittling the mechanics there.

I've never had a single problem with any of the alignments performed on my car, including multiple alignments done on my Nsx due to height changes and wheel swaps. Even til now, I've never seen a single post here on prime regarding a "proper" Nsx alignment with the arrows pointing at each other. Either way, I'm going to continue bringing all of my vehicles to The Shop San Bruno because of their friendliness, accommodations, and their capability to perform mechanical and diagnostic work on my cars.

Another +1 here for all of my experiences there. Plus! The new in ground alignment rack works amazing for lowered vehicles. Virtually no chance of damaging your front lips and rear diffusers. :)
Click to expand...

Wow, no proper way to do nsx alignment as long as the results are green? You think the arrows on the toe links are there for nothing? Will you ingore a tire rotation arrow?

Someone messed up my rear toe is a professional and a complaining customer is a jerk? What kind of world is this?
 
Last edited:
Didn't find an answer, all he said was that they SHOULD be aligned. Is that sufficient reason for you?
I believe the arrows are there for easy reference for someone who is constantly changing their alignment settings, for track, for street, for whatever, and uses those arrows in conjunction with a mark on the jam nut to count turns for toe in, for stability, or toe out for snap-steer response.
 
Konkordmusk said:
Didn't find an answer, all he said was that they SHOULD be aligned. Is that sufficient reason for you?
I believe the arrows are there for easy reference for someone who is constantly changing their alignment settings, for track, for street, for whatever, and uses those arrows in conjunction with a mark on the jam nut to count turns for toe in, for stability, or toe out for snap-steer response.
Click to expand...

Ok if that's what you think, ingore the arrows. You should read the whole article.
 
"If your toe link arrows do not point at each other before you begin (shame on the mechanic), you will need to add (or subtract) whatever it takes to line them up from the amount you turn the turnbuckle. More on that in a moment, just mark the turnbuckles as they now exist, and we can fine tune later using that reference. " well... that's from the bottom of the first paragraph.. pretty clear that they should line up in my opinion..
 
mr envy said:
"If your toe link arrows do not point at each other before you begin (shame on the mechanic), you will need to add (or subtract) whatever it takes to line them up from the amount you turn the turnbuckle. More on that in a moment, just mark the turnbuckles as they now exist, and we can fine tune later using that reference. " well... that's from the bottom of the first paragraph.. pretty clear that they should line up in my opinion..
Click to expand...

It still doesn't say why though. Just that they should be. Still no reasoning?
 
Konkordmusk said:
It still doesn't say why though. Just that they should be. Still no reasoning?
Click to expand...

Here you go.

http://www.nsxcb.co.uk/entry.php?593-Alignment-01

- - - Updated - - -

Turbo95Max said:
Hello this is Matt from The Shop. Id like to explain my side of the story and clarify a few things.

soyeah81 came in for a regular alignment and showed me some pictures on how to do it. I told him that it shouldn't be a problem because we have done plenty of NSX alignments before. After the alignment was finished he claimed we did not do it right because the arrows on the rear toe adjustments did not line up. I said we adjusted the rear toe that's why it did not line up, after a short discussion(approx 5-10 min, not even close to 1 hour) I agreed to realign it after we finished another car that was on the alignment rack already.
During our discussion, He said if I ask any NSX owner they would know what he is talking about. I had 1 NSX there at the time and he went to ask that NSX owner and he did not know what soyeah81 was referring to. Shortly after, a different friend of mine dropped off his NSX for an alignment. Before he was able get out of his vehicle, soyeah81 literally went up to him and started asking him numerous questions. My friend simply said "I don't know, I just drop the car off and have Matt align the car". soyeah81 even approached my technician after he finished the other car alignment and stated "you sure you aligned that correctly?" in my opinion this comment was unnecessary.

Lastly, I am sorry that soyeah81 is unhappy with his alignment, I thought we had made things right when we aligned it for him again to his liking. I am also sorry that he thinks I have an attitude. I never felt that I was giving him attitude but I will take that as constructive criticism. We've been doing NSX alignments for years, so no we did not learn how to do our alignments from soyeah81.
Click to expand...

I think every one should have an idea how long that I had to argue with Matt for him to redo my alignment in proper way. Until now, they still don't understand how important to align the two arrows and they claimed they know NSX alignment. 5 to 10 minutes argument? No way!!

Mike C and WashabiS2K,

Don't know how you guys would feel if you discover your toe link arrows aren't align and Matt tell you "we adjusted the rear toe that's why it did not line up"?

"We've been doing NSX alignments for years" I don't know how many rear toe links that they messed up.
 
Last edited:
Wow *speechless!

Well I have never taken my car to the San Bruno shop but quite honestly I would not trust any shop besides Auto Innovations in Milpitas for my alignment jobs.

I don't see all this hype for a in ground unit. My NSX is SLAMMED as well and with the proper boards, we can still put my NSX on their "above ground" alignment rack. As with any job, it's not the tools but the person who handles the job. I rarely leave my keys to the NSX to anyone but AI gets my trust.

As for the OP, I was not there so you have your right to vent ~ it's up to the rest of us to take it for what it is and decide for ourselves.

Disclaimer: Never met the OP nor have I been to the "The Shop"
 
soyeah81 said:
What 5 to 10 minutes? That's not even enough for me to talk Matt and his friend (the white NSX owner) and try to show Matt the other Black NSX's rear toe that just came into the shop. Clearly Matt is lying here.

Roger,

"^^ Fair enough"???

Matt didn't tell you guys how he tried to redo my rear toe. He lifted up my car on a regular rack and try to twist the outer toe link to align with the inner toe link. This is really piss me off. He definitely think I am stupid. Adjust the alignment without on the alignment rack? I told him don't touch my alignment unless it is on the alignment rack. Here is another 20 minutes argument.

If they knew the proper way of doing NSX alignment, he should agree with the instruction that I showed him the first place without having me to talk to his white NSX owner friend. How can you say you know the NSX alignment when you disagree with the NSXPRIME instruction?

Any NSX owner here, if you have done the alignment from The Shop, you should check your rear toe. If the arrow on the outer toe link doesn't align with the inner toe link, take it back have them redo the job.
Click to expand...


You are correct, I didn't post the entire story on here because I didn't think everything is relevant. Yes we tried to align the arrows on a regular rack because that's what I thought you wanted. I even told you if I do that then the toe will be off. Once we clarified everything we then put it onto the alignment rack. I do not think you are stupid, that is your own assumption. I also left out parts of conversation where I felt you were being very disrespectful and laughing in my face.

Clearly I am lying? How is that clear? There were about 10 witnesses that day and if you want to accuse the witnesses of being biased, there were about 5 of them that have no connection to me. I even had customers comment about your behavior after you left. I left that out of my story as well because I didn't think it was relevant, nor did I think it was very productive. I don't think I need to prove to anyone that I am telling the truth, you and I, along with 10 other people all know what happened.

I did not disagree with nsxprime's instructions, I simply said we have that information and know how to align the nsx.
 

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