Fixed versus Variable Servicing

[glospete]

As I understand it when my new car is delivered I have to choose either fixed period or variable servicing. As I've no experience of this can you give me the benefit of your experiences please? My annual mileage is likely to be maximum 10,000 and this will be longish journeys rather than town driving.
Any advice appreciated.

[Crasher]

If you care about the car or intend to keep it long term, go fixed annual interval.

[-M-]

I always stick with fixed interval servicing. Variable servicing was/is a gimmick in order to attract fleet and commercial sales and always has been.

Volkswagen here in Oz only do fixed service intervals - no longlife/variable at all, even for commercial vehicles.

[Crasher]

Longlife servicing kills engines.

[h5djr]

I am now on my 8th Audi A3 and every one has been on variable servicing. I am now retired and currently do around 12-14,000 miles but used 18-20,000 to do more. All of my A3s have been privately owned and have indicated a service required at around 18,000 miles. Some while ago Audi in particular asked the major oil providers to work with them to develop oils that would work for longer than the then norm of 10,000 miles and longlife oils and variable servicing was the result. Personally I have never had any engine problems with any of my A3s or my Golfs before them. People who say variable servicing is not good for an engine are living in the past. If variable servicing is not good for any engine how come 10,000 is the magic figure. VW used to recommend servicing every 3,000 miles at one stage long ago. Things have moved on, firstly to a 5,000 mile service interval and then to 10,000 miles and now to variable, which in my case is 18,000 miles in an attempt, by the manufacturers, to reduce the overall cost of ownership. If Audi are prepared to offer a 3-year 60,000 mile warranty if variable or fixed interval servicing is used then they must be confident that no major problems are going to occur.

As things stand at the moment my next new car is likely to be a Golf VII rather than another A3 because I prefer the interior design of the Golf to the new A3. When I do change my new Golf will be set to variable interval servicing.

[EssexGonzo]

I am now on my 8th Audi A3 and every one has been on variable servicing. I am now retired and currently do around 12-14,000 miles but used 18-20,000 to do more. All of my A3s have been privately owned and have indicated a service required at around 18,000 miles. Some while ago Audi in particular asked the major oil providers to work with them to develop oils that would work for longer than the then norm of 10,000 miles and longlife oils and variable servicing was the result. Personally I have never had any engine problems with any of my A3s or my Golfs before them. People who say variable servicing is not good for an engine are living in the past. If variable servicing is not good for any engine how come 10,000 is the magic figure. VW used to recommend servicing every 3,000 miles at one stage long ago. Things have moved on, firstly to a 5,000 mile service interval and then to 10,000 miles and now to variable, which in my case is 18,000 miles in an attempt, by the manufacturers, to reduce the overall cost of ownership. If Audi are prepared to offer a 3-year 60,000 mile warranty if variable or fixed interval servicing is used then they must be confident that no major problems are going to occur.

As things stand at the moment my next new car is likely to be a Golf VII rather than another A3 because I prefer the interior design of the Golf to the new A3. When I do change my new Golf will be set to variable interval servicing.

You make a very fair point here. But.....if you're on your 8th A3 I would guess that you don't hang on to them for very long.

It's possible that the downsides of longer service intervals might not be apparent until later in a car's life. Those of us who've done six figure mileages over several years and hope to do another 6 figures sometimes hope that more regular oil changes will lead to a longer life.

[glospete]

I am now on my 8th Audi A3 and every one has been on variable servicing. I am now retired and currently do around 12-14,000 miles but used 18-20,000 to do more. All of my A3s have been privately owned and have indicated a service required at around 18,000 miles. Some while ago Audi in particular asked the major oil providers to work with them to develop oils that would work for longer than the then norm of 10,000 miles and longlife oils and variable servicing was the result. Personally I have never had any engine problems with any of my A3s or my Golfs before them. People who say variable servicing is not good for an engine are living in the past. If variable servicing is not good for any engine how come 10,000 is the magic figure. VW used to recommend servicing every 3,000 miles at one stage long ago. Things have moved on, firstly to a 5,000 mile service interval and then to 10,000 miles and now to variable, which in my case is 18,000 miles in an attempt, by the manufacturers, to reduce the overall cost of ownership. If Audi are prepared to offer a 3-year 60,000 mile warranty if variable or fixed interval servicing is used then they must be confident that no major problems are going to occur.

As things stand at the moment my next new car is likely to be a Golf VII rather than another A3 because I prefer the interior design of the Golf to the new A3. When I do change my new Golf will be set to variable interval servicing.

I really appreciate your detailed reply and it seems that things may have moved on with modern oils. If I remember rightly my BMW company cars of some years ago only had variable servicing? But I guess there is no disadvantage (other than cost!) in having the annual service rather than the variable period.

[h5djr]

I really appreciate your detailed reply and it seems that things may have moved on with modern oils. If I remember rightly my BMW company cars of some years ago only had variable servicing? But I guess there is no disadvantage (other than cost!) in having the annual service rather than the variable period.

Yes the only real reason for having servicing at variable intervals is cost. I assume the reason you are buying a 1.4 TSI ACT is to save money in fuel and cost over a more expensive model so obviously cost is an important factor. I generally keep my cars for around 3 years and up to 40,000 miles I not that bothered what happens to the car after that. Variable servicing saves me the cost of at least one and usually two services. One of the disadvantages of buying a second hand hand car is that you have had no control over how the car has been treated since new. My cars always have a full service history with the supplying dealer and are usually traded in with the same dealer and they always give my a very good trade-in price so we are both happy. Modern engines give very few problems and most people are more interested in a good well looked after body and interior than what's under the bonnet. Unless you are personally going to keep the car for a very long time and want to spend more money than is really necessary then personally I would go for the variable service intervals.

[PjDali]

Yes the only real reason for having servicing at variable intervals is cost, but as I generally keep my cars for around 3 years and up to 40,000 miles I not that bothered what happens to the car after that. Variable servicing saves me the cost of at least one and usually two services. One of the disadvantages of buying a second hand hand car is that you have had no control over how the car has been treated since new. My cars always have a full service history with the supplying dealer and are usually traded in with the same dealer and they always give my a very good trade-in price so we are both happy. Modern engines give very few problems and most people are more interested in a good well looked after body and interior than what's under the bonnet. Unless you are personally going to keep the car for a very long time and want to spend more money than is really necessary then personally I would go for the variable service intervals.

Agree with your view h5djr.

I've asked Audi service technicians if I should even have an oil change done on my car between long life services and been told no need.


Interesting thread as I can see some value in ensuring regular services if you intend to keep a car for longer than 3 years.


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[Crasher]

No things have not moved on with modern oils or very importantly the filter. Running the oil for 20K damages the wallet of the 2nd+ owner down the line, which is why the 1st owners especially do not give a flying **** about what happens later. The 2nd and 3rd owners are the ones who start threads on here and on Facebook about Audi unreliability due to engine component wear.

[h5djr]

No things have not moved on with modern oils or very importantly the filter. Running the oil for 20K damages the wallet of the 2nd+ owner down the line, which is why the 1st owners especially do not give a flying **** about what happens later. The 2nd and 3rd owners are the ones who start threads on here and on Facebook about Audi unreliability due to engine component wear.

If nothing has moved on with modern oils, I assume you change the oil and filter in your car every 3000 miles as VW recommended many years ago. If you look at the VW specifications for oil you will see there are different specifications for short-term servicing and longer life variable servicing. Which oil you choice to use is down to the type a servicing being used.

[-M-]

If nothing has moved on with modern oils, I assume you change the oil and filter in your car every 3000 miles as VW recommended many years ago. If you look at the VW specifications for oil you will see there are different specifications for short-term servicing and longer life variable servicing. Which oil you choice to use is down to the type a servicing being used.

The oil being used in dealerships is what is recommended for the engine and not servicing type - many engines use longlife spec oil yet are on fixed interval services.

Another benefit to fixed servicing is that items replaced on a time scale do not require a seperate booking for instance brake fluid at 2/3 yrs or mot tests.

Some items due on a mileage basis will require seperate bookings as they will not sometimes coincide with a service if on variable ie DSG service at 40000 miles.

From experience I've seen vehicles on variable servicing have more visits to workshop based on a 4 year period whereas a vehicle on time and distance normally only has 1 dealer visit per year based on average mileage.

[Crasher]

If nothing has moved on with modern oils, I assume you change the oil and filter in your car every 3000 miles as VW recommended many years ago. If you look at the VW specifications for oil you will see there are different specifications for short-term servicing and longer life variable servicing. Which oil you choice to use is down to the type a servicing being used.

I don't mean that far back with oil going back to the sixties but modern oil's just can't cope with 20K+ miles, especially in a diesel, without some damage being caused to the engine and yes, I change the Quantum LongLife 3 and 24 month oil filter in my car every 3K miles.

[h5djr]

I don't mean that far back with oil going back to the sixties but modern oil's just can't cope with 20K+ miles, especially in a diesel, without some damage being caused to the engine and yes, I change the Quantum LongLife 3 and 24 moth oil filter in my car every 3K miles.

On what do you base your assumption that modern oils cannot last 20K miles. The oil in my A3s has been changed at around 18k. My current A3 is a 170hp 2.0TDI. I have had a couple of 140 2.0TDIs and a previous 170hp TDI as well as petrol engines before that. A total of 8 A3s so far and all of which had the oil changed at around 18k on the variable service setup. I kept these cars for around 40K miles and none of them gave me any problems. I know the chap who purchased my last 140 from the dealer and this car had been remapped to around 170hp. He has now down a further 20K miles and the engine still runs a good as ever. I presume you are much more qualified than the Audi/VW engine design engineers to determine the life expectancy of an engine. Some drivers would not get anything like 18k from the oil on variable servicing, especially if they do mostly short journeys but the sensors in the engine take this in to account and say the service is due much earlier. If a driver does mostly short journeys and a much lower annual mileage, such as my wife in her A1 who only does around 5,000 miles a year, then Audi recommend servicing at 10,000 miles or 2 years. The variable servicing is aimed at drivers who do a lot more that this and for them it works well and saves them money.

[Crasher]

Err melted engines (mine when I bought it rattled to death at 32K on one oil change), worn oil pump drive chains, tappet bucket failure, small end failure etc, all which vanish when the cars are put on yearly 9300 mile oil changes. It is not something based on a whim; it is the experience of working on LL oil change regime cars for the last 12 years. I did not read the rest of what you wrote as nothing will sway me form the knowledge that LL+ (the + is the "A" typical customer who adds a few K to the interval) kills engines toot sweet!

[Brycie]

Now I'm no mechanic or even a fiddler with cars at home. But even I would say that running a car for 40 or 60k miles wouldn't be long enough to give you any indication of what long life services and 20k old engine oil would do to a motor. If however you are intending, like me, to run your car into 150k miles +, then you're likely to see the results of running an engine on old oil. You are likely to never suffer any adverse affects by selling after 40k miles, but the person who buys from you & puts another 100k plus on it, will be in danger of suffering some of the damage highlighted in Crasher's post above.

[gupsterg]

I bought a car with "Long life" servicing... at the time I thought this must be the new thing going on and part of the strength of VAG design (wish I'd researched more!)... my car 70k miles, 6 yrs old, FASH@time of purchase...

I've had chains done (£2k fix) I have looked at info that suggest tensioner manufactured wrong cause but I've seen people with higher miles, same age, same engine but no issue and the difference is they do fixed interval servicing...

Personally going by my experience with past cars and this fixed is best, the cost of oil change is so low vs engine repair, etc, etc...

[vc-10]

So Crasher, would you recommend using the Long-Life oils (ie, to the 507 00 spec) anyway, but on the 10k/yearly basis?

[Crasher]

I use the LL3 Quantum oil but I am not convinced that it is any better then Platinum.

I have seen 1.8T VAG engines seize at less than 80K miles during the interval of their 4th oil fill including the factory fill.

[EssexGonzo]

However excellent the design of the lubricant, I'll be sticking to a fixed regime involving changes no longer than a year.

The exponents of the long life regime seem to be those who change cars often or who hold them for lower mileages possibly on a lease. As an owner who will be taking a car to 150k it's pretty obvious what is best for the car.

If my A2 (11 years old in one weeks time, 54k miles) had been on a long life regime it might only have had 2 services thus far!

[gupsterg]

So Crasher, would you recommend using the Long-Life oils (ie, to the 507 00 spec) anyway, but on the 10k/yearly basis?

I use always the recommend oil but do interval how I like... I've now done 2 oil changes in past 15-16 months, about 5-6K miles gap... 3rd will be done very soon...

IMO you can feel the difference of fresh oil...

[Guest 2]

Fixed all the way - A6 is set to 8.5k and the A3 12k (it's all motorway driving so I allowed a little more) and the inspection is set to 19k (air filter etc)

[h5djr]

A friend of mine has a rather bizarre way of running his Golf. He has the oil changed every 6,000 miles but always uses supermarket petrol. Strange.

[Guest 2]

A friend of mine has a rather bizarre way of running his Golf. He has the oil changed every 6,000 miles but always uses supermarket petrol. Strange.

That's hardly strange lol

[Brycie]

It is kind of strange, I know what he's getting at. Why be ultra cautious of what happens in your engine to the extent you do oil changes that often & then put crappy fuel in your car?

[Steven L]

Picked up my A4 tdi 170 Quattro with 72k on the clock that has been on LL servicing it's whole life. Last service was done in June around 600miles ago and it is black! I'll be changing it with some of this:

http://www.opieoils.co.uk/p-986-fuchs-titan-supersyn-ll-plus-0w-30-fully-synthetic-oil-for-vw-and-pd-diesel-engines.aspx

I have come from (and will be returning to when I fix it) Subaru service intervals of 6k or 6 months so the talk of 20k and 2 years is strange to me. I also have Seat Leon Cupra TFSi which is on fixed servicing at 10k or 1 year and was never offered anything else from the dealer.

Regarding the supermarket fuel thing, tesco momentum is one of the best fuels ( excluding V power) on sale as proven on dyno runs and many tuners in the Subaru world recommend it. I have used it in mine for years with no issues with knock.

[Guest 2]

You would be using 5w30

This link is VAGs own oil, its Castrol edge but with their own label.

Audi/VW Quantum LONGLIFE 3 Oil - 5w/30 - 5 Litres | eBay (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Audi-VW-Quantum-LONGLIFE-3-Oil-5w-30-5-Litres-/261066122885?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item3cc8c0e68)

Can be used for fixed services too.

[Steven L]

Cheers Chris.

Thought it was 0w30 for the long life stuff. Been doing a bit of reading and browsing opieoils site and they all say 0w30?

[Guest 2]

Audi have always told me 5w30 and that's what they put in in both my cars, all derv courtesy cars I've had out have had a 1l Castrol Edge topup in the boot.


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[Steven L]

Ok, I'll take your word on it. Cheers