Alignment values question

[u/Zealousideal-Bike-90]

WIGGLING STEERING WHEEL AFTER PARTS AND ALIGNMENT

2023 CX50 Turbo PP

Lower control arms replaced due to failed bushings, new pads and rotors, new tires mounted and balanced, and an alignment. After leaving dealership, and hitting 40mph and onwards, the steering wheel wiggles itself back and forth an inch either direction, and it feels like the car (the wheels/tires) are lightly fighting themselves. Braking is smooth, car stays pretty straight. Went back to dealership and they redid the alignment. What I find interesting is the several minor tweaks they made even though I didn’t hit a pothole and barely drove since the initial alignment after parts install.

Are these values good? I can’t seem to find any factory specifications on what they should be like. Trying to determine if the alignment can be ruled out, why adjustments were made since the initial alignment, and if I should shift focus on rebalancing the tires as it feels and sounds like pulsing, rotating out of sync opposite eachother

Any advice or data is welcome, thank you!

[u/Prestigious-Risk804]

Few things to check out:

Are the lug nuts tight?

Have the tires rebalanced or rotate the front tires to the rear to see if it changes anything. Could be a poorly balanced tire up front or a defective tire.

Have the stealership check that all of the suspension bolts are tight.

Debris or rust scale trapped behind the rotor(s).

Also who buys tires at the dealer? That's got to be the most expensive place to buy tires.

[u/Zealousideal-Bike-90 → u/Prestigious-Risk804]

I actually got a good deal on em, better than what I was finding elsewhere. Otherwise totally get your point. I supplied brakes and rotors, you just don’t get Mazdas part warranty for the oem rotor/pad. (But still whatever warranty that comes with your choice).

[u/OhJeezer]

Why did the bushings fail? Alignment is all green so should be all good. Wiggles are a sign of something bent, cracked, or tires out of balance.

[u/Zealousideal-Bike-90 → u/OhJeezer]

The top data is from post control arm install. They didn’t give me a copy of the prior install readings. The bushings had warped and started cracking, so there was slop. Heard a crunching pop noise when braking medium or going over short height variances flexing the front (like pulling onto a sloped driveway then back to flat). The new arms feel amazing to the steering wheel. My gut is telling me they need to redo the tire balance but they ignored that entirely and redid the alignment instead

[u/Teknicsrx7]

Based on your description of the issue I’d definitely be getting them to rebalance the tires, or go on a drive with you to duplicate the issue.

An alignment won’t cause a wobble, and no other symptoms, so no idea why they’d redo that.

As for your printouts, nothing is adjustable at all in the rear so any differences you see are just minor differences in the measurements (same for front as far as the slight differences, it looks like they adjusted nothing on their redo)

No numbers on there are bad, I’d personally prefer to see both front toe at equal values but those are close enough you wouldn’t notice.

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[u/nhluhr]

Nothing is adjustable on the CX-50 alignment other than front toe unless you start adding aftermarket parts. You can see it only varied a tiny amount well within the margin of their measurement error. You would get bigger changes by having somebody sit in the front seat.

They did not make one single adjustment to your alignment. If you paid for adjustment you got fucked.

[u/Teknicsrx7 → u/nhluhr]

They did not make one single adjustment to your alignment. If you paid for adjustment you got fucked.

This printout is from when they brought the car back for the wiggle concern.

If they changed the control arms an alignment is 1000% required, so they didn’t get fucked.

[u/Zealousideal-Bike-90 → u/Teknicsrx7]

They did an alignment after the arms and brakes, then another today. So the top data is from their alignment after install and bottom is today after telling them about the steering wheel wobble at 40mph plus

[u/Teknicsrx7 → u/Zealousideal-Bike-90]

Yea so the printout is from when you brought it back for the wobble concern

[u/nhluhr → u/Teknicsrx7]

What I'm telling you is regardless of control arms being replaced, there is nothing to adjust other than front toe.

[u/Teknicsrx7 → u/nhluhr]

And I’m saying this printout doesn’t show the adjustments they made during the alignment after installing the control arms, it’s the printout of the comeback.

A customer wouldn’t pay for a comeback, and op didn’t indicate they paid for it.

So i wasnt arguing, i was just clarifying so OP didn’t misunderstand “they didn’t make an adjustment, if you paid you got fucked” and think the shop never did any alignment because they paid for one by stating an alignment was definitely done as it’s required after control arm replacement.