Last week I went to the parts store and bought :Upper and lower control arms, shocks, pitman arm and idler arm. When I tried to install the idler arm the damn thing would not budge
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I chucked it up in the vise and leaned on it with 200 pounds. I ended up taking it back and they exchanged it. That one went on fine. When I was finished with everything the steering wheel was almost

180 degrees from straight and could not be corrected on the alignment machine. My buddy and his boss messed with it for an hour before they decided to order a new part. There was not much visible

difference in the two parts but the new Moog part stabbed right on and they were able to get it aligned and the wheel straight. Would you ask the parts store to make up the difference in the parts ($71)

and the labor ($60) for a total of $130?

Thanks for your input.

I would just take the idler arm back. Most aftermarket parts do not include labor. I only use MOOG if at all possible or OEM.

Good luck. Buying and installing factory broken shit from Autozone is what cured me from shopping there. They absolutely did not care that I spent 3 hours installing and uninstalling a power steering pump I bought that was shit.

Same with starters.

I dumped AZ years ago when I got tired of returning defective shit.  Go to O'Reilleys now.

But cars are better and I'm older so my wife won't let me work on them if it requires getting underneath.

But when I was young I was good.

Good Luck. It can't hurt to ask. Do the people at the store know you by name??

The store in question is Autozone, good deduction guys! I talked to the district manager yesterday and dropped the part off today. We will see what happens.

They don't know me by name but I spent almost $550 there in the last month.

We get paid warranty labor on failed parts, but never really had a situation where we got very far installing a wrong part.

They do know us by name and we spend ~30k/mo so they can't really afford to say no

Part was not "wrong" the computer called for that number and I was given the correct box I think the teeth were out of alignment with the fat index marks on the shaft. Today I asked the guy that put the new arm on what the difference in the parts was and he said the tooth spacing was slightly different.

Wrong/defective/improperly made, I tend to use them interchangeably. Didn't mean to imply that you got the wrong thing.

It drives like a new, much less noisy truck but Moog from now on.

Get the refund on the part and eat the labor, or education the hard way. There's an AZ within walking distance of the house and I would go in there for a few things but now there's an O'Reilly a few doors down and I haven't been back to the zone since. Another source for parts is Rock Auto. If you have time to wait on shipping it's the way to go and you can usually save significant dough even with paying to have it shipped. They have a good selection of name brands such as Moog and TRW as well some OEM brands too. I did a front end rebuild on a Dodge 3500 several years ago and saved about $400 on the parts. They also run 5% off promos all the time and once you've bought from them a few times you'll get them emailed too you or you can easily find them on the web.   They use multiple parts distribution centers throughout the country and have received parts from one in Houston and two different ones in the Dallas area so even ground shipping gets it to you pretty quick.

Jester

Good to hear +1 on rock auto.
I tried to buy a tail light lens from them but they were out by the time I had my cash together.

Worst they can do is say "No."

Well, they could laugh their asses off while saying "No," but you get what I mean.

They took care of it!

Nice!