Welcome to Empire Auto Care, your premier destination for wheel alignment in Ft. Lauderdale and Palm Bay, FL. Proper wheel alignment is essential for maintaining the stability, safety, and efficiency of your vehicle’s steering and handling. Over time, factors like potholes, curb impacts, and normal wear and tear can cause your wheels to become misaligned, leading to uneven tire wear, drifting or pulling to one side, and decreased fuel efficiency. At Empire Auto Care, our skilled technicians utilize advanced alignment equipment to precisely adjust your vehicle’s suspension components, ensuring that your wheels are properly aligned according to manufacturer specifications. With our expert wheel alignment services, you can enjoy improved handling, enhanced safety, and prolonged tire life. Trust Empire Auto Care to keep your vehicle performing at its best with professional wheel alignment services tailored to your needs. Our Fort Lauderdale shop services Pompano Beach, Wilton Manors, Lighthouse Point, and Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, while our Palm Bay shop services Melbourne, June Park, and Grant-Valkaria.
Alignment Services Prevent the Need for Tire Repair
Proper alignment is necessary for even tread wear and precise steering. A misaligned vehicle will also affect your gas mileage and could result in tire damage which goes beyond tire repair services. It’s always cheaper to prevent tire damage than to replace it with new tires.
Wheel Alignment Services in Fort Lauderdale & Palm Bay FL
Research indicates that the average car is driven about 12,000 miles per year. A car with toe alignment just 0.34 degrees ( .017 inches) out of specification is equivalent to a car that has dragged its tires sideways for more than 68 miles by the end of the year! At that point, tire repair may be out of the question. As a tire service wheel alignment is an investment worth doing.
How to Know if Your Car is Out of Alignment?
Have your car checked if you notice the following:
- Excessive or uneven tire wear.
- Steering wheel pulls to the left or right.
- Feeling of looseness or wandering.
- Steering wheel vibration or shimmy.
- Steering wheel is not centered when car is moving straight ahead.
Many vehicles today are equipped with rear suspensions that can be adjusted for alignment. Our certified alignment technicians can tell you if your vehicle requires a two or four-wheel alignment right here in Ft. Lauderdale, Pompano Beach, Wilton Manors, Lighthouse Point, and Lauderdale By The Sea.
The most common adjustable angles are:
- Toe: This refers to the tilted direction of the wheels toward or away from one another when viewed from the front. Toe is the most critical tire-wearing angle. Tires that “toe-in” point toward one another. Tires that “toe-out” point away from each other.
- Camber: This refers to the tilt of the wheels toward or away from one another when viewed from the top. Wheels that tilt in toward the vehicle have “negative camber.” Wheels that tilt away from the vehicle have “positive camber.”
- Caster: This refers to the angle of the steering axis in relation to an imaginary vertical line through the center of the wheel when viewed from the side. “Positive caster” is the term used when the vertical line is tilted back toward the rear. If it’s tilted forward, we call it “negative caster.” The proper caster angle stabilizes your car for better steering.
- Thrust Angle: This refers to the relationship of all four wheels to each other, as well as their relationship to an imaginary centerline that runs from bumper to bumper. The term “thrust line” refers to the direction in which the rear wheels are pointed. Thrust angle is correctable on cars with adjustable rear suspensions. If your car has a non-adjustable suspension, thrust-angle is compensated for by aligning the front wheels to the rear wheels.
Why Four Wheel Alignment?
- Reduced Tire Wear: Improper alignment is a major cause of premature tire wear. Over the years, a properly aligned vehicle can add thousands of miles to tire life.
- Better Gas Mileage: Gas mileage increases as rolling resistance decreases. Total alignment sets all four wheel parallel which, along with proper inflation, minimizes rolling resistance.
- Improved Handling: Does your car pull to one side? Does the steering wheel vibrate? Do you constantly have to move the steering wheel to keep your car traveling straight ahead? Many handling problems can be corrected by total alignment. With all the system components aligned properly, road shock is more efficiently absorbed for a smoother ride.
- Front End Inspection: A suspension system inspection is part of our alignment procedure. This allows us to spot worn parts before they cause costly problems.
Wheel alignments should be checked at least once per year or anytime you have your tires replaced. We would be happy to set up an appointment for you to check your wheel alignment.
Looking to keep your wheels rolling smoothly in Ft. Lauderdale and the surrounding areas? Look no further than Empire Auto Care, your one-stop tire shop for top-notch tire services, repairs, wheel alignments, and tire rotations in Pompano Beach, Wilton Manors, Lighthouse Point, and Lauderdale By the Sea. Our dedicated team is here to ensure your tires are in tip-top shape, so you can hit the road with confidence.
Bad Alignment puts your safety at risk
If you have experienced your car pulling itself to one side all the time, then it is surely caused by faulty wheel alignment. While it is hard to drive on a wet road even with properly aligned wheels, driving on the same road with poorly aligned wheels would be worse. Plus, you are putting your life at risk, too. Rather than considering how much you will spend on alignment, you must consider the safety that our wheel alignment service guarantees you and those riding with you. Also, it is a lot cheaper than what people think.
Better gas mileage with correct tire alignment
When your wheels are aligned properly, it cuts down on rolling resistance, which means that you car doesn’t have to work as hard or burn as much fuel in order to move forward. This is good news for everyone: Not only do you spend less money on gas, but you also get the satisfaction of knowing your car is responsible for less pollution.
Expert Wheel Alignment in Ft. Lauderdale & Palm Bay FL
Even the slightest problem with your alignment can have disastrous effects on your tires. If your tires have too much or too little toe-in (the degree at which they point in toward each other at the front, like a person who stands pigeon-toed), a narrow strip on each tire will wear down very quickly, causing you to have to get new tires sooner. By getting regular wheel alignments, you ensure that your tires wear evenly, making them last as long as possible.
Empire Auto Care can help improve the quality of your ride, the efficiency of your handling, the precision of your steering and stop the “pulling,” which causes your vehicle to veer to one side while attempting to drive straight. All of these things can become dangerous as time goes by. So, trust us to ensure your car is maintained well, and is always in good condition, which is for your safety.
Call us today to inquire about our Ft. Lauderdale FL and Palm Bay FL wheel alignment services.