Mathew J wrote:

Wondering when others are being instruced per the manufacturer/dealer to have their first oil change performed?? both myself and my wife read the service guideline manual and also the stealer reinforced that the car needs its first oil change at 7000 miles?? yet I come here and see many are doing it at 1000 or less and alternating between regular and synthetic oils?...is there a part of the manual I am missing regarding breakin proceedure short of the keeping it below 4K RPMs and no hard breaking??

Thanks

Alot of people in here are very anal (myself included to a degree).  I wouldn't wait 7,500 miles as the manual states for your 1st oil change.

I plan on doing one at around 3,000 and they having the dealer doing it at around 7,500 and then doing an oil change every 3,750.

Some people are changing their oil very early on as they may be small metal shaving from engine break in that they want to get rid of.  Not sure how much the filter picks up, but even if you were to wait 7,500 as SAAB states, it is not going to be the end of the world.

My personal believe is that SAAB states to wait to 7,500 miles because they are paying for the service for the first 2/24,000 and doing it every 3,750 would be an added expense on them.  Also, I believe Subaru states to do it sooner (check out Nasioc).

If you go to syn, you may be just fine with 7,500 mile changes.

Use the seach, lots of info on this already.

Last edited by turbo20vjetta (2005-07-01 08:19:18)

turbo20vjetta wrote:

My personal believe is that SAAB states to wait to 7,500 miles because they are paying for the service for the first 2/24,000 and doing it every 3,750 would be an added expense on them.

I disagree - that is a normal recommended service interval for many cars on the market today.  It has nothing to do with SAAB's free oil change costs either - those are really quite minimal. 

The OEMs and the dealers are actually in a bit of disagreement over oil change intervals.  OEMs now trust and advise (based on engineering research and development) that some cars can actually wait that long for their first oil changes.  Interestingly, I read on a board (either this one or another) about how owners of older model Jettas ran into trouble by changing their oil earlier than the first recommended oil change interval because they flushed out a special lubricating chemical that they didn't know that VW put into their oil to ease engine break-in.  I don't know for sure that story is true.  However, I believe that the OEMs have absolutely no intention of providing advice that would cause premature wear or failure - because of warranty issues and customer satisfaction.  If the advice is bad, they'd probably get sued - they already get sued for all kinds of things you'd never believe someone could try to hold an OEM responsible for.

Another place this debate plays out is with the feature called oil service interval lights.  Some vehicles have oil service interval lights set to go off at the frequency the OEM recommends.  But dealers don't like that feature because it cuts service department profits. And customers who believe in more frequent oil changes either don't like it or try to figure out how to rig it to match their preferred schedule.

Of course if you are using a vehicle for high performance purposes, you might want to be more careful with it.  I can totally understand that.  However, the trend in the industry is going against low mileage oil changes as part of break-in.  And there's nothing deceptive about that.

I disagree - that is a normal recommended service interval for many cars on the market today.  It has nothing to do with SAAB's free oil change costs either - those are really quite minimal.

I will have to look up what Subaru states, but why would SAAB state that it is OK to go longer between oil changes that Subaru?  Most auto makers will say that you can go (for an example) 7,000 miles under normal driving conditions or 3,500 miles if you are under "hard" conditions.  Unless I missed it, SAAB doesn't state this.  Again my personal theory is because of the 2/24,000 mile free service.  Maybe I am wrong.... but that is my conspiracy theory for now.   

Edit:

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthr … e+schedule

Subaru states 6,000 miles.  Edit again, that looks like Canada. 

Opps, looks like Subaru says the same thing as SAAB:
http://www.subaru.com/owners/schedules/ … EDULE_2005

FYI, here is the NASIOC oil FAQ:
http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=499177

And as far as the VW issue with break in... while that may be true, for the 1.8t in the Passat and I believe the A4, VW changed their interval from 7,000 (or something around there) to 3,000 miles because they were having sludge issues destroying a bunch of engines. 

Last edited by turbo20vjetta (2005-07-01 10:40:29)

turbo20vjetta wrote:

And as far as the VW issue with break in... while that may be true, for the 1.8t in the Passat and I believe the A4, VW changed their interval from 7,000 (or something around there) to 3,000 miles because they were having sludge issues destroying a bunch of engines. 

Yeah, that happened to me. Driving down I-95 near Philly in my A4 1.8t when the engine started to make a weird ticking noise, and then it just seized up. Had 48,000 miles at the time. The car was towed to an Audi dealership in Princeton where a friend of mine worked. Diagnosis was a failed oil pump (there's a little screen inside that gets clogged over time, and when that happens, the pump "eats itself" as he put it). Which led to a destroyed engine. My friend told me this was a direct result of an oil change interval that was just way too long. And he was certain the interval had been chosen by Audi primarily to save a few bucks, since they, too, offer free maintenance for two years. VW's intervals were shorter for the exact same engine, which makes no sense except from a cost savings perspective (no free maintenance with VW).

eurospeed wrote:

Mathew, you are not misreading anything in the manual.  Many of us here have technical backgrounds, wrench on cars, etc., and have come to modify the suggested service intervals for varying reasons.  My reasoning is based on my understanding of engine design and tribology.  The fundamental reason to change oil early in the engine's life is to remove any contaminants.

Though it might seem somewhat inconsistent with my comments above, I also agree with Eurospeed.

It can be prudent to change your oil early, though you may never see with your own eyes whether there was any contaminant present.  It is also a good idea to be over-cautious if you are operating a high-performance car and plan to push it hard.  So, I agree that there is nothing wrong with changing your oil early (as long as the replaced oil/chemicals match what need to be in the vehicle for break-in).  It's just that it may make absolutely no difference.  One never knows.  I can't object to the idea that it's "better safe than sorry."

My only strong objection is to the idea that the OEMs are deliberately specifying inaccurate oil change intervals in order to save money on free maintenance.  What a dumb idea that would be - offer consumers bad advice and give them the impression they won't damage their car if they live by that advice.  Seriously, I work for an OEM and nobody I've met here thinks that way.  Luxury brands are even more sensitive about quality issues - for logical reasons.  And oil changes are very inexpensive to rebill inside the system - despite the significantly greater cost to the consumer if the consumer pays the dealer directly.

With the Audis and VWs - the issue sounds to me like the actual parts or system did not perform under real world conditions as expected when tested (i.e. engineers leaving engines running for 75K miles, but not in a car, in a lab).  Or the suppliers didn't produce the parts correctly.  That's different from the marketing end of the business telling the owners' manual writers - "Hey, put longer service intervals in there - we've got to save $20 bucks per car on this deceptive free maintenance promotion we're trying to run here."  If you want to see how costs are saved, please read the following from the Saab website.  Put simply, the Saab 9-2x is a less expensive car than the other models, so they are offering 1 year less maintenance.

http://www.saabusa.com/saabjsp/owners/

"The Saab 9-2X is covered under the Saab No-Charge Scheduled Maintenance Program for 2 years or 24,000 miles, whichever comes first. All other 2004 and 2005 Saab Models* are covered for 3 years or 36,000 miles, whichever comes first. No matter which Saab you choose, the No-Charge Maintenance program requires you have your Saab serviced at an authorized Saab dealer in the United States."


So, in short, change your oil if you want to or need to, but I really think there is no conspiracy story here.   But of course, if you don't trust the OEM, why would you trust me?

BlkKat wrote:

Though it might seem somewhat inconsistent with my comments above, I also agree with Eurospeed.

It can be prudent to change your oil early, though you may never see with your own eyes whether there was any contaminant present.  It is also a good idea to be over-cautious if you are operating a high-performance car and plan to push it hard.  So, I agree that there is nothing wrong with changing your oil early (as long as the replaced oil/chemicals match what need to be in the vehicle for break-in).  It's just that it may make absolutely no difference.  One never knows.  I can't object to the idea that it's "better safe than sorry."

My only strong objection is to the idea that the OEMs are deliberately specifying inaccurate oil change intervals in order to save money on free maintenance.  What a dumb idea that would be - offer consumers bad advice and give them the impression they won't damage their car if they live by that advice.  Seriously, I work for an OEM and nobody I've met here thinks that way.  Luxury brands are even more sensitive about quality issues - for logical reasons.  And oil changes are very inexpensive to rebill inside the system - despite the significantly greater cost to the consumer if the consumer pays the dealer directly.

With the Audis and VWs - the issue sounds to me like the actual parts or system did not perform under real world conditions as expected when tested (i.e. engineers leaving engines running for 75K miles, but not in a car, in a lab).  Or the suppliers didn't produce the parts correctly.  That's different from the marketing end of the business telling the owners' manual writers - "Hey, put longer service intervals in there - we've got to save $20 bucks per car on this deceptive free maintenance promotion we're trying to run here."  If you want to see how costs are saved, please read the following from the Saab website.  Put simply, the Saab 9-2x is a less expensive car than the other models, so they are offering 1 year less maintenance.

http://www.saabusa.com/saabjsp/owners/

"The Saab 9-2X is covered under the Saab No-Charge Scheduled Maintenance Program for 2 years or 24,000 miles, whichever comes first. All other 2004 and 2005 Saab Models* are covered for 3 years or 36,000 miles, whichever comes first. No matter which Saab you choose, the No-Charge Maintenance program requires you have your Saab serviced at an authorized Saab dealer in the United States."


So, in short, change your oil if you want to or need to, but I really think there is no conspiracy story here.   But of course, if you don't trust the OEM, why would you trust me?

BlkKat,

I too remember that issue surrounding the VWs with the Jettas, haven't read the vortex in a while so I had forgotten about it but there were many many concerns after the fact as people were rushing into their preconcieved notions of break in proceedure without consulting the manufacture for reasoning first.

Personally as I mentioned to euro above I was surprised to read that many seem to be using traditional oil in their cars for break in which would be fine for the NA linear models but I have always been under the presumption that anything with a turbo or supercharger unless of course it was self lubricating such as paxton's generally are needs to be running a synthetic oil at all times....not even synth blend would work as the turbo/supercharger needs proper and consistant lubrication, something standard oil just cannot accomplish.

I also don't believe for a second that the OEMs is trying to pinch a few pennies with the oil changes as it will only come to bite them in the butt later on...having worked for a Saab dealer in the past the thing I can say is that they would never do anything that had the potential to hurt their reputation...and something like this could backfire bigtime...maybe if GM didn't care about Saab I could see it, but even at that they would only be hurting themselves as it would make them look worse than they currently do (GM and American car manufacturers that is)...

Does all of the previous discussion apply to Linears also? I just rolled 1100miles, and was planning to have my first 1k oil change, just as I did when my Mazda was new. I have seen various threads say that Aeros have synth from the factory. Has this been verified? I will probably just call my dealer and see what they say.

I forgot to mention that I took delivery of my Linear 3 weeks ago, but the production date was May or June 04, so I am slightly concerned about the age issue too.

Has any one noticed when they register their car on SAAB website and choose "heavy" vs. normal driving that it recommends the 7500 mile service at 3750/4 months?  I wonder if this is covered under the 2 years/24K free service?  If it, I guess one can just tell their dealer that they are driving under the heavy service schedule and get oil changes at every 3750 for free until 24k.  This is my plan.