IS300 allingment issues

I was hit on the driver side by a car changing lanes who forgot there might be other cars on the road. We were not traveling fast, and I was able to avoid most damage. Only the fender was dinged and needed repairs. Insurance took its time to get settled, and when that finally happened I took the car in to be repaired. I drove the car for about 2 weeks before repairs and over that time there was no change in drivability or handling. Now the car is almost finished but the repair shop has encountered a problem. Apparently the car is 3 degrees out of alignment. From what I know about alignment 3 degrees is a lot, probably easily visible just by looking. I went over the the shop, they had the car on a lift, and with the shop manager we measured several points along the control arm and u-joint to points on the frame. Everything came back identical to the other side. There is nothing we can see that is wrong, but the computer still spits out the 3 degree off reading. We even did it on another machine to test it out. Now they want to throw some parts at the front end to see if that will solve the problem. The only problem is the car is driving perfectly, with no pulling or miss aligned steering. Does anyone out there know of another problem that might be causing this alignment error? The shop seems pretty well run so I don't think they are trying to pull anything over on me, and insurance is paying anyway. But they still can't really tell me what is wrong. Any ideas?

3 degrees? Since you seem genuinely interested in knowing....

A car's front wheels have several alignment adjustments: camber, caster and toe-in.

Camber is each wheel's vertical angle which is expressed as degrees from

90 degrees meaning that the wheel is 90 degrees vertical to the roadway (usually) plus about 1/4 or 1/2 of one degree so the top of the wheel is ever so slightly farther out from the axle than the wheel's bottom. To much or too little camber causes tread wear on one or the other side of the tread and can also cause a car to "pull" to one side.

Caster is the angle between the wheel's top and bottom pivot points, its also known as the kingpin angle (even though cars haven't used king pins since the '50s). I believe this is what's 3 degrees "off" not something that can be measured with a tape for the angle only shows itself when the front wheels are turned, not straight ahead. The effect of this angle is felt in a car's steering as under or oversteer, also called "wandering" - it won't stay straight, even on a straight and flat road. One enters a turn at say 50 mph and the car is slow to respond so one turns a bit more and suddenly the car oversteers and turns too sharply. One may notice 3 degrees or not. Caster doesn't much affect tread wear.

Toe-in is the front tires' parallelism. The wheels should be slightly closer (1/8 to 1/4 inch) at their leading edges vs. their trailing edges. The tires' rolling resistance "presses" the steering linkage and the toe-in is absorbed by the slight looseness in the linkage allowing the wheels to be parallel.

Body shops check alignment and insurance companies pay for that to avoid liability of releasing a repaired but unsafe car to its owner. I suspect that your car may have had the 3 degree caster difference between its left and right sides before the incident; if not, then the incident bent the car's structure - unlikely given your description.

Hope this helps you get back on the road.