Main dealer or self service??
Discussion
Hi all, looking for people's opinons....
I've owned my 2002 1.8T Golf GTI for 10 years now, the longest I've ever owned a car. It's in great condition & has done just over 85k miles, I bought it at 3 years old with 7k on the clock.
It's led a fairly easy life & up until now has always been serviced by the supplying dealer annually regardless of mileage. Recently though I have changed jobs & will be doing approx 15k miles per annum in journeys of no less than 40 miles at a time so not as if it's stop start usage etc.
I'm not planning on getting rid of the car yet & will probably keep racking up the mileage as the engine is sweet & Touch wood it has never let me down. But although I like the fact that the supplying dealer has always serviced it I do find myself wondering whether it's a bit like spending unnecessarily when I am more than capable of servicing it myself. Furthermore, over the last couple of years the dealership have got progressively worse in their attitude & customer service levels.
What do you guys think, carry on paying the dealer for the receipt / stamp in the book or service it myself with genuine parts & keep receipts etc??
I've owned my 2002 1.8T Golf GTI for 10 years now, the longest I've ever owned a car. It's in great condition & has done just over 85k miles, I bought it at 3 years old with 7k on the clock.
It's led a fairly easy life & up until now has always been serviced by the supplying dealer annually regardless of mileage. Recently though I have changed jobs & will be doing approx 15k miles per annum in journeys of no less than 40 miles at a time so not as if it's stop start usage etc.
I'm not planning on getting rid of the car yet & will probably keep racking up the mileage as the engine is sweet & Touch wood it has never let me down. But although I like the fact that the supplying dealer has always serviced it I do find myself wondering whether it's a bit like spending unnecessarily when I am more than capable of servicing it myself. Furthermore, over the last couple of years the dealership have got progressively worse in their attitude & customer service levels.
What do you guys think, carry on paying the dealer for the receipt / stamp in the book or service it myself with genuine parts & keep receipts etc??
I service all my cars myself once they're out of warranty, like you I keep my cars for a long time.I do keep a detailed log of all work done and receipts, they also get the best oil I can find (running Fuch race pro S in the focus ST170 and Millers CFS Nano in the Audi). I trained as a vehicle engineer so am confident working on all parts of the car. I still do use a garage for the jobs at this time of the year I don't want to tackle on the driveway, the clutch and flywheel replacement on the Audi being one of those jobs!
or find a local indy who knows the cars - after that kind of usage have you ever had the oil pickup checked? If not it'd be worth doing as a preventative measure so you don't get oil starvation issues.
You could always do a 6 monthly oil change at home and get the indy to do a full service annually to check the car over and give you a stamp? I'm guessing the stamp won't make much difference to value now - if you sell it'll be bought on condition
You could always do a 6 monthly oil change at home and get the indy to do a full service annually to check the car over and give you a stamp? I'm guessing the stamp won't make much difference to value now - if you sell it'll be bought on condition
its not a car with a huge value so i would get it serviced right as cheap as you can , general stuff like oil and filter changes you should easily be able to do on the side of the road if need be , keep the reciepts and note the details down , bigger stuff a trusty local garage should be fine
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