Long Life services

[Bren]

My A6 is due for a service, I have been shopping around for prices.

Due to it having a history and being low mileage I wil bite the bullet and get it done at an independent. I have been given one quote of £275+ vat at an independent which I think is expensive even though it includes pollen filters (there are two) and long life oil.

 

Long life oil. Anybody know what it is?

 

I have always been of the opinion that a cheaper oil changed every 6k is more beneficial than that snake oil left in for 20k.

 

 

 

Apparently this engine was on a long life service plan. Given the reputation chain driven Audi's have for having problems I think an oil change every 6k is a better bet.

[steveo3002]

my bet is long life oil is whatver barrel they have stood in the corner at alot of places

 

buy something decent and diy it ...

[EssDeeWon]

It doesn't mean anything, Just play it safe and have it serviced annually regardless of miles.

[fordperv]

Oooh that's a bad bot of black death, i havn't seen anything like that since I bought an escort 1.4 cvh that had snapped it's timing belt, the cam was seized solid and the top end full of what I'd describe as shoe polish consistency oil

 

I would definately ignore the prescribed service intervals and change the oil more often

[Parky]

Long life oil is oil that is supposed to last 18000 miles or so. I occasionally use it in my daily if it's on special (usually expensive) but still change it every 6000.

 

Force of habit really, I can't help but feel that the optimistic 18000 mile intervals are based on autobahn mileage and not sitting in London traffic for hours on end, or short journeys. Tend to agree a cheaper oil every 6000 is a better long term idea. After that kind of mileage a cheaper oil will still have some lubricating properties and some of the detergent additives left in it, can't help but feel that a long life oil won't have much of either after 12000, yet alone 18000 miles

[Timewaster]

My company Focus had its first service at 25000 miles?!

[mjrose]

Our family Octavia has had long life services from new and has now done 175k with zero issues. Our local specialist thinks long life services are fine when you rack up miles quickly and don't do many short journeys.

[sierraman]

I'd be inclined to ignore the manufacturer schedule of changing every 20k and do it at half that. At the end of the day Audi won't give a shit if your engines fucked at 100k, they're only prerogative is to convince you at that point you should have took up their PCP plan.

 

How old is it? If it's out of warranty or getting on a bit I'd be inclined to do the service yourself.

[Pillock]

My work Astra has first service "around" 25k, but is on variable servicing so actually it pinged up around 22k. It's now on 28k, and the oil life indicator is showing 49%..... which surely means it's going to need another service around 34k.

 

Our Touran was on long life variable, but it gets abused - short journeys from cold etc. I wasn't too trusting that the logic that flags up when it needs a service based on oil quality, mileage, average speeds etc will kick in so I changed it to regular 10k servicing. I think you can swap it that way using the service light reset method but you can't swap it back again, the dealer needs to do that. Anyway, the only real difference is the oil that you should be using - long life needs VW507.00 spec, and regular can be run on 505.01 I think. I have to bloody google it every time anyway. You don't even need to change the service interval, it only controls the service light, but that's a useful reminder in a car I don't have to keep a record of mileage on.

[Parky]

VW/Audi long life needs 504/507 spec oil. These are usually Mobil 1 / Castrol Edge and mega coin.

 

I did find a local place which sells AC Delco 5/30w synthetic for £22 which matches these specs - in fact it meets pretty much everyone's top spec and my Bini loved it. I have seen it cheaper online as well.

 

If you are doing the fixed 10k service route, I have found the Halfords 5/40w synth meets the VW 502/505 spec (fine for annual servicing) and is usually around a tenner for 4 litres on Bank Holidays and Christmas. Pretty good value and made by Comma so it should be decent enough. I have used it over the last couple of years with a change every 6000 and the car runs fine. And the fact the emissions are low, and economy fine would suggest the engine is in OK shape

 

Would it be worth providing your own oil and filters? Might knock £20 off the bill?

[panhard65]

I serviced a Peugeot 5008  yesterday and it is on 20k service intervals. This was it's second service as for some reason it was done at 8k and was now on 31k. I have managed to convince the owners that 2 years and 20k miles is a bit too far to go. For the full service and all the filters including a bastard pollen filter that all the information tells you is behind the glovebox, its on the drivers side behind the center console. It came out at 270 and that was with longlife oil. The oil is important even if you are going to change it more reguarly as it is a low ash type and should help it not block up the dpf. It doesn't need all the other filters every 10k but I would certainly change the oil and filter at 10k max intervals

[cort1977]

I'm pretty sure my VW T5 needed VW 507.0 whatever regime it was on, variable or distance based.   As ever, the cheapest oil that meets the VW/Audi spec for low ash etc should do the trick.

[HH-R]

I always change every 6k, but I've only ever had 1980s designed petrols that just take cheapy 10w40 or maybe 5w40. Only do between 5 and 10k a year so it doesn't get too expensive.

 

Bollocks to cars needing long life fancy expensive spec oils, though they're gonna be harder to avoid as years go by.

[MarvinsMom]

the rover 75's diesel is supposed to be serviced at 15000 miles.

 

in the past it has been done pretty much at these intervals, but me been a dipstick has taken to getting it done at 10k intervals instead. 

 

i think leaving it much longer than that is just asking for trouble.

 

and as for these 25k intervals, it is i think a reasonably cynical ploy by the car makers just to sell more cars. if the owners old car fucks up, cos the engine is full of sludge, then they can sell them a new one!

 

the jaguar gets a service either annually or at 10k, as the handbook says at a local jaguar specialist, while both the metro and mini get new oil and filters every 5k. transverse A series are hard enough on their oil with it also lubing up the gearbox so for the few quid it costs then i'd sooner just do it, usually by me on the outlaw's drive.

[Parky]

As we all have a certain amount of mechanical sympathy and pay for our own cars (mostly) I think we are much more cognisant of the need to keep our repair bills down. One of the best things you can do to get a decent life out of an engine is to keep the oil clean*

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* may not apply to Renault Laguna 2

[EssDeeWon]

Shite should be serviced at least once a year. If you follow that rule of thumb you can't go too far wrong. (Not that im saying an A6 is shite)

 

No doubt the pistonheads crew will tell you once every 3 years or 50,000 is fine.

[320touring]

My xud is telling me 5800 miles til service time..

 

was only done last sat!

[scaryoldcortina]

As we all have a certain amount of mechanical sympathy and pay for our own cars (mostly) I think we are much more cognisant of the need to keep our repair bills down. One of the best things you can do to get a decent life out of an engine is to keep the oil clean*

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* may not apply to Renault Laguna 2

Funny you should say that, I reset the oil service indicator on the Lag when I changed the oil (just before the FTP incident).

 

I looked at it today, it says 17,875 miles to next change. I wonder if it means oil or engine?

[cort1977]

I think all this long life servicing has come about mainly due to the 'cost per mile' metric for fleet managers.   If you can reduce the estimated number of services in the first three years then the running costs are less obviously.   This puts pressure on the engineers to sign off on longer intervals or monitoring settings than they might do otherwise.   

 

Having said that condition based servicing is not unreasonable from an engineering standpoint, big marine diesels have their oil analysed regularly and servicing carried out depending on the results.

[Parky]

Funny you should say that, I reset the oil service indicator on the Lag when I changed the oil (just before the FTP incident).I looked at it today, it says 17,875 miles to next change. I wonder if it means oil or engine?

If it states 17875m on the dash display, the "m" is probably referring to metres...

[Bren]

Funny you should say that, I reset the oil service indicator on the Lag when I changed the oil (just before the FTP incident).I looked at it today, it says 17,875 miles to next change. I wonder if it means oil or engine?

It means bridge.

[Guest Lord Sward]

I spent a day at the Liquid Moly Oils HQ last year in Germany for Car Mechanics.  Their chief chemist totally disagreed with Long Life oils.  

[AndyW201]

My works Sprinter is currently on 24,000 miles. The dash display tells me it's first service is due in just over 6,000 miles...

 

Good job all our vans are now on 3 year lease deals. We used to easily get nigh on 300k miles from our Sprinters when the company bought them outright but can't see it happening on the latest ones.

[gordonbennet]

Was chatting to one of the MAN lorry mechanics last week, asked him about current lorry engine oil change schedules, 70,000kms apparently which is what 42k ish miles?, feck that even if the filtration is a world apart from car engines.

 

Oil is so bloody cheap and so easy to change compared to the hassle time and money involved in not looking after your cars, just aint worth it.

 

Cars of the type likely to have been long life serviced i won't ever be buying into, unlikely to ever get another German when the current Merc is eventually sold, and Toyota/Subaru which are my first choices have never gone down this LL road which must have cost them in lease sales...Scooby got their fingers burned badly enough with their rushed out 2.0 litre Diesel of doom.

[320touring]

As we all have a certain amount of mechanical sympathy and pay for our own cars (mostly) I think we are much more cognisant of the need to keep our repair bills down. One of the best things you can do to get a decent life out of an engine is to keep the oil clean*

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* may not apply to Renault Laguna 2

Speak for yersel;)

 

more GLF then GTF sometimes

[UltraWomble]

I serviced a Peugeot 5008  yesterday and it is on 20k service intervals. 

Same with the wifes C8.

It gets done every year which with her mileage also happens to be about 6000 miles.

I just pitty the poor car its first three years of life when it did 20K miles and had one service, then we bought it and the (Citroen Main) dealer was telling us it wasnt due a service for 10K miles - black tar came out of that sump

[catsinthewelder]

My stuff tends to get done every year if it's in regular use so about 5-10k

 

The work stuff is all newish so mostly on 20-30k intervals.  The Vauxhalls get done more often as if someone stops the engine while the DPF is regenning then the diesel filled gack gets dumped into the sump, if this happens 3 times then the service light comes on.  I suggested that we started changing the oil and filter ourselves at the halfway point but after all attempts to find the sump plug on one van failed we gave up on that idea.

[stripped fred]

Shite should be serviced at least once a year. If you follow that rule of thumb you can't go too far wrong. (Not that im saying an A6 is shite)

 

No doubt the pistonheads crew will tell you once every 3 years or 50,000 is fine.

I think most people on pistonheads also realise long life servicing is not a good idea. It's only people who have no interest in cars, or fleet managers, who want to spend as little as possible who think it's a good idea.

 

I agree that once a year is a minimum. Changing your own oil is cheaper, you know it's done properly and it also gives you chance to check other things with the car at the same time.

[stripped fred]

When I bought my 2001 A4 1.9pd about 10 years ago I wanted to treat it right so had it's first service done at an independent garge. After it was done I asked them what oil they had used? Had they used oil conforming to the 505.01 spec? No, they had used 10w 40 from a huge drum in the corner of the workshop. Apparently they used that for all cars they service irrespective of what the manufacturer specified. Needless to say I changed it and then did it myself from then on.

[Jim Bell]

I don't think small independents could stock enough quantity of every grade of specialist oil to keep every customer 100% happy and turn a profit.

If I put a car in for a big service and the car requires specific oil, I blag some in the ECP/GSF sale and leave it on the passenger seat.