Doodad Installation/Service Costs

[MarineHawk]

Thanks guys. I've driven about 15 miles since I did it. I'm futilely going to try to find some level ground around here and remeasure and then, if necessary, tweak it a bit.
Seriously, I appreciate all your advice and saving me from the unnecessary departure of $300.

[MarineHawk]

Update:

As of now, my front skid plate is about an inch higher than before. The front of the rockers are about 1/4" lower than the back of the rockers. Am I in the right ballpark as far as lifting without rearing out my front end?
Here's the frustrating part:
When sitting on "level" ground (there really isn't any such thing around here, but I get pretty level side-to-side), I've got it to where the wheel well height is the same on both sides. However, the passenger side rocker panels are about 1/4" higher. Why?? Tires have same PSI. This varies depending on where the truck is sitting. Any invariable slight cant to the pavement must make a difference. Once, I measured in one pretty-level spot, and the wheel well height was 1/16" greater on the driver side, and the passenger-side rocker was 1/4" higher. Then I moved it to another level spot, and the the wheel well height was 1/16" greater on the pasenger side - but the passenger-side rocker height was now only 1/8" inch greater. In other words moving to another spot gave me more hieght on one side above the tire, but less on the same side under the rocker.
It seems to me that, if one (as with me) cannot find the perfectly-level and flat slab, the wheel well spacing is more accurate because, as long as the front tires are planted at the same level, it should come out correct. Any curvature of the pavement, however, may affect the rocker measurement. Is that a fair assumtion? Any other advice on how I could do this with more NASA-like precision? I am a little worried that I turned the driver side bolt about two more turns than the passenger side bolt, and it's basically level now. Does that mean it wasn't level before? Am I too worried about it being perfect?

Should I just tweak it as well as possible, and just tell the allignment guys to allign? Or should I ask them to make sure it's level? Unfortunately, I have a lower degree of confidence that these $200 guys can do the level thingy on their own as opposed to the $500 guys.

[MarineHawk]

Thanks Phil. The one thing that still has me baffled is that, if I level by measuring the wheel well height, the rockers are off. For instance the wheel well heights are now about even, but the rockers are off by 1/4". I assume that, if I levelled the rockers, the wheel well height would then be off by about 1/4". Which do I pick? I have the sides of the front bumpers pretty close. So, I assume the wheel well method is probably okay. But I'm just not sure which method is the most accurate.

[MarineHawk]

Okay, I can't post photos, but, now that I'm basically level, I assume the jounce bumpers should look about the same.
However, the point on my passenger-side jounce bumber is touching the control arm about 1 inch inside of the mark where it came from the factory. The point on my driver-side jounce bumper is pointing just a tiny bit to the OUTSIDE of that mark and is about 1/2" above the control arm (there is a 1/2" gap). What does that mean? Sounds bad to me, but I'm just guessing.

[MarineHawk]

I've already been informed by a couple of knowledgeable people on here that this is probabaly not a real big deal, and it seems even less so after 3 cabernets and 6 Bass Pale Ales, but for completeness sake, here's the two differing jounce bumpers:

[MarineHawk]

Driver side:

[MarineHawk]

Driver side:
Oh, never mind:

"Error
There was an FTP (file transfer) error. The detail is 'Upload to '/testdir/test.txt' failed. Detail: '552 Transfer aborted. Disk quota exceeded''."

I just posted a 69KB phto and five seconds later, I can't post a 49KB photo. Interesting.

At least on that last photo, you can see my bada$$ FT Tie Rod I got from TrailDuty!

[ree]

Originally posted by ree:
Cognitos? Don't know. I'm having mine done in the next couple days ...

FYI, I just had my cognitos installed and alignment done for $125. Time was ~100 minutes.