My Octavia 1 has an automatic gearbox and I am told it is "sealed for life".

The 20 valve engine will apparently manage 500,000 miles and the body is guaranteed for 10 years, so what does life mean Automatic gearbox wise?

Peter:confused:

Is the oil not meant to be changed every 60K miles?

life is until it dies

Very good LOL

Rephrasing rapidly "What is life expectancy?"

Change it at about 50k and you'll do fine, and lets be fair changing it too often won't hurt anything except your wallet, but not changing it might cost you some repairs.

Personally I'd get the oil from a VAG dealer too.

VW often stated for other parts (e.g. older xenon headlights) that life is about 150kkm or 100k miles, or 2000hrs in case of headlights. A bit short life, but good enough for VW to get your car out of warranty and start paying for repairs. I also happen to think that change after 60k - 90k miles is a good idea.

well - if your gearbox goes, you can't blame VAG for it, after all the oil is "long-life".

I changed mine when I installed the Peloquin diff, and intend to do so every once in a while. Think there are reports of gearbox whine going away with oil changes so I'm very leery of claims of it lasting for ever....

dunno about vag stuff, but my vx box was like that. when i went in to get some gearbox oil i was told not to bother as its to last the lifespan of the gearbox!

but my gearbox has a breather, i presume to stop any build up of pressure. so the oil is open to atmosphere, and as we know oil will degenerate in these circumstances. so therefore my car (which had done 100k at the time) would really benefit from a oil change, as im sure the vag boxes would too. its now done 120k and is still nice and quiet, and my OH's car did 130k before the engine died of water poisoning!