Maybe your kids got a hold of her one weekend while you were out of town and used your FJ like she was meant to be used. Rode hard, rolled in the mud, washed off and put up wet.
It could happen...

 

Pics would help a great deal. Seems highly unlikely that you could have a bent frame without really thrashing on it or being in a decent fender bender. My first thought would be to take it somewhere else and get a 2nd or third opinion.

 

I'm with Shack.
Possibly, say if you were backed up to a wall crooked or an obstacle, a hard obstacle was just behind one side of the bumper. Someone backs into you with force and torques the frame, but not hard enough to destroy the bumper cover.

Then again, I keep going back to those darn kids on a joyride....

 

Ha, no kids... (yet) and for my off-roading I tend to use my 66 Bronco. The Bronco paint is very old, scratched on every corner, I've slid the frame on rocks and it's set up with 3 tanks so it's goes on dirty roads far and beyond.

The second opinion said the front of the frame looked good but my frame was slightly diamoned, he thought it was a manufactures defect. Possibly it wasn't set up on the welding jig properly from the factory as there are no signs of being hit or damaged.

When I have time I'll get another frame shop to check it out.

In the dealers defense, the alignment is already starting to pull to the right again, weird.

 

I have always loved those older boxy Bronco's

As far as alignment, I believe that they adjust them to slightly pull right for safety. Just in case you were to fall asleep at the wheel, it would tend to drift off to the right instead of oncoming traffic to the left. An alignment technician told me that 20 years ago when I worked at Sears Automotive slinging tires for a living.

 

I would tend to not believe anything a dealer says. I have seen a few frame get bent and it takes a lot to do that. I say go to Firestone and get a lifetime alignment.

 

Actually I do have the Firestone Lifetime Alignment on the FJ. They're the ones that said something was wrong but their guess was ball joints on both sides.

The dealer thought it was the drivers side lower control arm.

I agree, I have no idea how the frame could be bent... weird.

 

So, how many times has Firestone performed the alignment before they found this anomaly that sent you asking the dealer?
Like liquid chicken asked, are you the original owner? I got the impression that you were.

 

Are you the only owner? I'm thinking not

An 07 with 68K is barely used IMO.

If you say youre the only owner then something is not making sense. If you recently bought it and that's the story the last guy gave you and this really is an issue with the frame, sorry but you were lied to.

Here's why things don't make sense:

If you are the only owner and something (as severe as frame damage) was wrong with the alignment and it was a "factory defect" you should have noticed LONG before now. You also should be on at least your second set of tires so you should have discovered this issue at that point too.

So either youre the second owner and are dealing with someone elses problem now or as the only owner, something has happened to your truck recently by someone other than you.

Nothing else would make sense given the vehicle history you shared.

 

If you bought it used, that car was smashed hard and restored.
Else, there are three possibilities. One is that the car was not straight from the factory. If that was the case, nobody would have been able to align it before. Was it aligned before?
Two, you may have hit a hole at high speed and bent it. It happened to me. If you are going fast enough, all you hear is the bang, but the suspension goes down and up too quickly to notice much. I actually broke a wheel that way once and the z-joint another time. When you break the wheel, you notice it very quickly, your tire pops out, you see lots of sparks, and if it is the rear tire, the car spins of, giving you a few doughnuts before it takes you off the road. So, I don't think that was it.
Three, the frame is not bent.

 

I am the second owner.

The first owner was a pilot in the air-force. When he owned it, the FJ was either parked on base or in his garage.

To say the first owner was a clean freak would be a huge understatement. Both of his cars, the FJ and his BMW were immaculately clean and meticulously detailed.

He handed over every single receipt from the day he purchased it to the day he sold it to me. I am a cautious shopper and if he said it wasn't in an accident I would believe him. Even the 07 skid/bling plate didn't have any scratches or blemishes at all.

Currently the FJ is on it's second set of tires. Toyo, A/T Open Country 265/70R17.

It did align well when I first purchased it but over the past 6 months I've aligned it 3 times and it wasn't holding the alignment. That's why I went to the dealer to have it checked and learned of the lower control arm bushing problem.

It is possible that I hit a bump at high speeds, I've driven through a lot of construction zones in L.A. traffic and have put 18k miles on in just about one year but it would have to be one hell of a bump.

Thanks guys!

 

So will it get in spec but not hold the alignment, or will it not even get in spec? Did they try and align it after they replaced the LCA?

I had a similar issue recently. I ended up getting new (actually used) spindles and new LCAs and now all is well. The passenger side wouldn't align correctly. After talking to some people I suspect I bent the spindle, but I was never able to confirm this.

I'd ask the dealership to ensure the spindle isn't bent.