Annual MOT for the 2019 1.4 Vitara. Checked all the necessaries and everything seemed to be in order.
Only 11k miles in the past 12 months, 6.5k of that on my continental motoring holidays. Very few stop start journeys, shortest is normally 15 miles, and the Shell Helix 5-30 oil still looked almost like new.
So just how important is an annual oil & filter change, given I’m using good quality oil and the engine is sweet as a nut with only 44k miles on the clock ?
Friends with company cars, with big annual mileages, only change their oils every 35/40k miles up & down motorways 5 days a week.
Just curious….
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In view of the comparatively low cost of an oil change if the manufacturer recommends it avoiding it might prove a false economy.
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Assuming the car's out of warranty I'd be leaving it a bit yet...
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>> In view of the comparatively low cost of an oil change if the manufacturer recommends
>> it avoiding it might prove a false economy.
>>
Cynical me thinks that the manufacturer hopes you’ll visit the main dealer once a year. It always goes to a trusted indie but given the improved quality of engine oils in recent years, my usage, mechanical sympathy etc, in future I seriously think I’ll skip the routine annual oil change, unless circumstances change.
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My wife’s vitara is the 1.6 petrol . Last oil change was in 22 , about 14k miles ago . Checked the level and condition last week and it’s mint . I’ll probably do it later this year. I use 0/20 oil in this one .,
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BMW specs 18k miles changes with the correct oil. It has an oil quality monitor they claim, but funnily always says it needs changing at 18k. Anyways, it got two at 18k each during warranty, and then I dropped it down to 12k or annualy regardless of what it says it wants. At 110k engine still sounds sweet, turbo sounds ok & no oil in intercooler.
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>> . It has an oil quality monitor they claim, but funnily always says it needs changing at 18k.
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...fairly standard. The electronics generally have a max mileage, with a condition sensor to check that it can reach that mileage. If the oil is degraded (by whatever) it will demand a change before the mileage.
The software I have for the 'van allows checking both for remaining mileage and oil degradation level.
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>> ...fairly standard. The electronics generally have a max mileage, with a condition sensor to check
>> that it can reach that mileage. If the oil is degraded (by whatever) it will
>> demand a change before the mileage.
Coded out in the states, where the system is set for fixed mileage. (8k from memory?) Americans love their 'lube jobs"
Last edited by: Zero on Fri 8 Aug 25 at 09:31
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I think I'd change, the cost is low in a years expenditure. If you added the cost to px cars and holiday spends it would be small in comparison.
I'd be surprised if people were running company cars to 40k between oil changes but I guess they only have to work until they hand it back.
I suppose it might also affect the px price if it's going soon.
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I've always been of the opposite opinion - that extended (2-year) service intervals were largely introduced to appeal to fleet buyers, reducing the nominal cost of ownership.
I've never been happy with this for my own vehicles (considerably less concerned when the company were taking the risk, and ownership would max out at 3 years).
Accordingly, on the few vehicles I've had that don't have annual intervals, I've always done an intermediate oil and filter change (and particularly on the motorhome).
There can't be much more than £50 DIY work on yours if you're careful where you source appropriate oil from (say £40 plus a filter).
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I think it was HJ who said, "Oil is the cheapest component in the engine, and the hardest working"
I never go beyond 10k.
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Older Suzukis: Suzuki Franchise Servicing
The 10-year warranty applies to older Suzukis as well, as long as they are still within the 10-year/100,000-mile limit.
A son has a Toyota Aygo as a family runabout - say 5K/year.
Toyota service was about £280 rather than about £150-£180 at the Indie. However if a big ticket item were to go wrong it will be covered.
3rd Party extended warranties are often .not worth the paper they are written on.
The extra £100 seems good value.
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If you mean Peter Lorimer, then yes according to Companies House.
honestca_32 on ebay, apparently according to his X-page.
Last edited by: Biggles on Fri 8 Aug 25 at 13:29
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Every 12 months for me regardless of milage (rarely do over 9k per year).
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>> Every 12 months for me regardless of milage
This makes no sense at all. Oil does not 'go off' after 365 days. In modern cars the sump is not open to the outside atmosphere and gets hot very quickly so any moisture is removed, thus preventing degradation from microorganisms. I change the oil in my 1980 TR7 usually well before the the recommended 6,000 miles, but as it now only does a few hundred miles a year, it has only been changed three times this century - 2002, 2013 and 2019. The engine still works perfectly at admittedly only 73,000 miles. Our other cars - every 10k miles.
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>> >> Every 12 months for me regardless of milage
Same here for my very low mileage 23 years old Japanese barge.
Not too costly at my local indie.
Last edited by: Clk Sec on Sat 9 Aug 25 at 10:28
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>> >> Every 12 months for me regardless of milage
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>> This makes no sense at all. Oil does not 'go off' after 365 days.
Oil DOES go off, nothing to do with water or microrganisms, its the acids from the combustion and the soot from the EGR that does for it., Low mileage, short runs helps to kill it. Thats why they put detergemnt and dispersants in it, not antibiotics.....
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That.
Exactly.
We can argue in the margins about old sports cars doing an annual mileage of diddly but for those of us with ordinary use of ordinary cars it's not worth faffing with.
Just change it.
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Back in the day I had 2 customers who never changed their engine oil.
One had a Volvo 240, and the other one had a V6 Transit. Both were business owners who clocked up the miles.
My wife's 21 reg Vitara goes to the pain dealer every year, it's an automatic mild hybrid 4x4 so needs that extra warrantee ... Justin Case!
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>> Friends with company cars, with big annual mileages, only change their oils every 35/40k miles..... up & down motorways 5 days a week.
Modern rep's cars have long legged gear boxes and engines with far more power than necessary, so trundling along at often over 30mph per 1000 revs means the engine is hardly ever stressed and almost always at best operating temperature. They are not bothered about a bit of increased wear at 120,000 miles because by then they'll be getting a new car - if not before.
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Every car I've had since at least 2000 has a service indicator in the dash. At their simplest they were driven my (a) mileage and (b) time. Some, the first two Skodas, might have had a little added sophistication.
When the light comes on it gets serviced. The service includes an oil and filter change.
Except perhaps in the pandemic year we do sufficient miles, in either car when we had two, that I'm not going to over think whether the service light means what it says or not!!
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Once a year both cars go into the garage - MOT (if required) + service including oil change, irrespective of mileage.
One car is ~a year old and does 12-15k pa - a mixture of mway and local. Other is 15 years old and does 2-3k pa - very much second car for local trips and back up.
The 1st gets serviced to manufacturers spec to keep the warranty alive. When it expires it will still get serviced, albeit by local garage not main dealer. It would be easy to omit the oil change on the 2nd with no impact on trade in values etc.
I no longer want to crawl around the car doing routine servicing and repairs. The cost of adding an oil change may add £40-60 to the annual cost for each car - a trivial amount set against the risk of major engine failure and makes later sale/trade in much easier - it genuinely has FSH.
Last edited by: Terry on Sat 9 Aug 25 at 17:26
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Friend of mine runs a Skoda something. 2 years old , done around 14k miles . Oil service prompt in the dash display. Took it into the dealer , they reset the light ( no oil change) and sent him on his way. So much for a leased car service plan .
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re my original post.
Forgot to say I’d had the MOT, oil change, air & pollen filters, new plugs ( every 6 years according to my friend who’s a time served mechanic and seems to know his stuff).
£270 all in.
We got to chatting about other matters and I forgot to ask him about the importance of annual oil changes for the Vitara given my mileage & use.
Up on the ramps for a thorough underbody inspection and all seems in good health.
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>> Forgot to say I’d had the MOT, oil change.......... new plugs
>> ( every 6 years according to my friend who’s a time served mechanic and seems
>> to know his stuff).
Well, that 'stuff' doesn't make sense to me. Surely they wear from use, not the passage of time. Has your friend passed any relevant exams with a reputable certificate on display?
However, I am grateful for this reminder as I vaguely thought that spark plugs should last around 40k miles these days. My TR7 now only does a few hundred miles a year and my records show that I gave it some new spark plugs in 1990 at 54,000 miles. I had forgotten the handbook recommendation to change them every 12,000 miles. I see that I inspected them at 64,000 miles in 2008, but as they looked OK I merely cleaned them, checked the gap and put them back. They still seem to provide a decent spark even though they are apparently 35yrs old......and have done another 9000 miles. Ho hum - a job for sometime this autumn.....
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Modern cars with coil packs generate considerbly higher voltage, hence spark erosion, even with modern plugs is higher. BMW quote every 36k miles for my B58 engine.
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>> Modern cars with coil packs generate considerbly higher voltage, hence spark erosion, even with modern plugs is higher. BMW quote every 36k miles for my B58 engine.
100k miles on our Honda, although a set of plugs (iridium tipped) is around £100.
Perhaps turbo charged motors burn through them faster?
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>> Perhaps turbo charged motors burn through them faster?
I would suspect stuff like that, state of tune etc has something to do with it.
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In the USA BMW 'recommend' spark plug replacement at 60k miles or 6 years for the B58.
I recall that, some time ago, the EPA were trying to mandate a minimum service life of 100k miles for spark plugs in engines produced after a certain date.
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>> Modern cars with coil packs generate considerbly higher voltage, hence spark erosion, even with modern
>> plugs is higher. BMW quote every 36k miles for my B58 engine.
In that case, plugs should last much longer than the advised 12,000 miles for my TR7's ancient coil/distributor set-up......which indeed they have! I wonder why the advised change interval was set so low?
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>> In that case, plugs should last much longer than the advised 12,000 miles for my
>> TR7's ancient coil/distributor set-up......which indeed they have! I wonder why the advised change interval was
>> set so low?
Other factors, low tech plugs, poor fuel, bad timing, inconsistent fuel/air ratios, etc etc
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>> Friend of mine runs a Skoda something. 2 years old , done around 14k miles
>> . Oil service prompt in the dash display. Took it into the dealer , they
>> reset the light ( no oil change) and sent him on his way. So much
>> for a leased car service plan .
>>
That's was never my experience at Skoda main dealers. I generally keep cars for at least a decade usually from nearly new. I always had at least an oil change when having a service whilst under warranty and a couple of years afterwards. However I usually asked for my cars to be moved to fixed service intervals rather than variable. I had Skoda cars from 2001 up to last year.
Last edited by: BigJohn on Sat 30 Aug 25 at 22:59
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Suzuki - Engine oil changes - CGNorwich
