At the risk of starting a religious war... :think: : What is your experience and advice on longlife/variable service vs. fixed annual one? Just to put some context, my car is on 60K at the moment, and is likely to be adding about 6-8K per year.

 

Thanks

George

The more regular you service a car the better it is for the engine, but still use long life oil as it is better for it.

 

I service mine every 6 months (I do 20k a year) using 507 oil, with oil and a filter at less than £40 it's not worth not doing it. Every 2nd service it gets air, fuel and cabin filter so all in it costs me £115 per year plus a couple of afternoons.

Thanks, I assume you do your own oil changes?

I am generally a DIY man, but at the moment at least I will stick to having my service done at my local independent VAG specialist. Not only because I actually trust their experience, but more importantly because for the price of the change, I get a full inspection of the car, check for error codes, and a road test. That way they can tell me about things that I wouldn't normally spot (like the CV boots being split or perished, or a joint that is loose, or pads that are wearing thin, etc.) It has saved me some major agro with my Passat before. And if something is bugging me I can usually drop in and get some advice, so I think I'll stomach the extra cost for the moment, for the extra benefits.

:-)

If you journeys aren't very short you would probably end up servicing based on the time limit rather than the miles (I think it gets programmed for 2 years or some calc based on estimated soot loading of the oil factoring in driving style).   On the 1.9 the variable intervals have been implicated in the camshaft wear issues seen on that engine I believe, but I don't know of anything specific for your engine (but I'm just an interested amateur).

 

I know on my car at the fixed intervals I won't need to top up the oil, but the longer variable intervals I will need to top up a little bit over the course of the interval.

 

It is easy to reset the service indicator for fixed servicing (just a magic sequence with the buttons on the instruments) but resetting variable needs a quite specific sequence in VCDS-Lite, or the full version of VCDS to do it the easier way.

 

I've gone over to doing the long life oil with the fixed intervals myself.  

 

Sounds like the best thing to do would be to ask the specialist you are using what they think.  I personally wouldn't on a car that is doing so few miles.

Longlife ofc...

Long life service was invented by VAG for Lease Car companies to reduce their costs and maximise profit margins.

If you love your car get the oil changed max 10k intervals.