Guest bastaad525 Posted October 18, 2005 Share Posted October 18, 2005 hey all. As many of you know I recently bought a new Dodge SRT-4. I'm reading over my owners manual and warranty info, and seeing they have two different 'maintanence schedules' in there. One for 'regular use' and one for 'heavy duty use'. One is every 3k miles and the other every 5k. now, on every car I've ever owned, I have always stuck to a 5000 mile schedule. I've done sooooo much reading and research and chatting with knowledgeable people (many of you Hybrid Z guys!), mechanics, guys who race professionally, guys who build engines... and have long since come to the conclusion that the 3000 mile oil change is BS... ESPECIALLY if you're running synthetic oil, which has been proven time and again to maintain it's effectiveness WELL past 3000 miles. Also, the filter is of utmost importance... a good filter though will also be effective way past 3000 miles, and I always use a Mobil 1 filter to go along with Mobil 1 oil in ANY car I drive. So as far as I am concerned, every 5000 miles is fine. However, Dodge in it's infinite wisdom (and desire to make a few extra bucks) seems to think 3000 miles is required, and states plainly that if I have problems with the car and bring it in, and I haven't stuck to their recommended schedule, my repairs may not be covered by warranty! But even on top of that, reading Dodge's recommendations for sched a or b, I seem to fall well out of the 3000 mile sched. b's requirements. Item by item, here are the conditions that 'require' a 3000 mile maintanence schedule, prefaced with this statement "use this schedule if you USUALLY operate your vehicle under one or more of these following conditions. And line by line, here is how those conditions DON'T apply to me: - live in an area where temps get below freezing (32 deg F). No prob, I live in SoCal, lowest we usually ever get is 50's or MAYBE high 40's? - Stop and go driving. Yeah, plenty of that in Socal. However, I work graveyard shift, and usually only drive to and from work. Usually no traffic at 10pm or 6am on my route. Sure I get stuck every now and then, but the preface says USUALLY... - extensive engine idling. I just dont do it. Burns gas, burns up cat converters. only time I sit idling is cooling down the turbo before shutoff. Hell even sitting at a drive thru fast food place I usually shut off if the wait is long. - dusty conditions. I dont live in the desert. I dont' drive in a labratory either... but if the city is considered 'dusty conditions'... then the only way you can get out of this one is by driving around with your car wrapped in saran wrap. - short trips less than 10 mi. Again, I almost exclusively drive only to work and back, which is a 22 mile trip each way. Gas is too expensive and my mile too crappy to drive around town doing errands, so we take the wifes car for local stuff. - more than 50% of your drive is at high speeds in over 90 deg F weather. Sure, i drive high speeds, and it does get hot here, but again I usually only drive early morning or late nite. - trailer towing. nope. - taxi or deliver service. nope. - off roading. nope. - running ethanol. nope. So... with all that in mind, and again taking into account the HUGE amount of data there is out there that suggests that you DONT need to change oil every 3000 miles especially with synthetic oil... I think I should just stick with Schedule A (every 5k miles). my main concern is, is this going to cause the dealership to try to screw with me on warranty work? how far do i have to go to prove to them that I qualify for schedule A? Any tips/advice for how I can deal with the dealership if this problem ever comes up? I think they are really trying HARD to force the 'average' driver to stick to 3000 mile service when we really just don't need it, and considering I've just taken on a car payment, I wouldn't mind saving a couple bucks by not doing maintanence when it just isn't needed. Advice guys! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikelly Posted October 18, 2005 Share Posted October 18, 2005 Seek specific guidance from the dealer you'll be using. Don't trust what you read on the various BBs.. Talk to the service manager, and this includes mods... Ask them what THEY consider to void your warranty. Dodge has played dirty ball with the diesel truck mods a lot of owners have done, so make sure you get it in writting before bolting anything on. Also, Keep receipts for all oil changes and maintenance you perfoprm yourself, to include filters, parts, and fluids... You must keep all paperwork if you want to be prepared for an eventual head to head with some service manager... Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pop N Wood Posted October 18, 2005 Share Posted October 18, 2005 In the automotive advice column written by two guys names Click and Clack, they claim there are some cars that legitimately require a 3k oil change interval. Something about super tight tolerances yielding a very low tolerance to contamination. They specifically referred to a Saturn. My advice is to follow what the manufacturer recommends. Also I wouldn't get overly worried about oil changes violating your warrantee. If you bring the car in with a blown motor, an inch of sludge in the crankcase and the original oil filter, then they are probably within their rights to deny your claim. If you honestly keep up with the oil changes and something goes wrong, a reputable shop will be able to tell. Of course the key word is reputable. But keep in mind most warrantee claims are not oil related. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moridin Posted October 18, 2005 Share Posted October 18, 2005 All I can say is, its a forced induction car (especially turbo), so changing the oil more frequently is already a must. A testament to frequent oil changes is my friend's turbo'd Volvos. His dad has over 300,000 miles on it and they've always changed the oil short of 3000 mile intervals since new. It still runs like a beast. His other modded 740 ran over 225,000 miles before he went for a newer, stronger built motor. Turbo's (especially newer ones) have much smaller tolerances that oil has to cycle through to keep it healthy. If you run the car hard and shut it off without a good cool down, it will also shorten the ability of the oil to do its job effectively. For more good info, check out http://www.bobistheoilguy.com Lots of awesome info and they advertising on where to get your oil examined to see what a good run interval would be for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted October 18, 2005 Share Posted October 18, 2005 Just to show the other side of that coin, when I worked for a Volvo dealer we had a guy with a 740 Turbo who had 750,000 miles on his car and always had the oil changed at 5000. Dino oil not synthetic too. You get up above a certain mileage (think it's 300,000) and Volvo sends you a little badge for your grille. This guy had a couple... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
80LS1T Posted October 18, 2005 Share Posted October 18, 2005 Doing your oil change every 5000 will not void your warrenty unless your dealership has a bunch of A-holes behind the counter. Most dealerships are so competitive now that they dont want to piss you off when your under warrenty because they dont want to loose you as a customer when you go out of warrenty because they you start paying. Now if your a "good" customer and you have problems once your out of warrenty you are more likely to get help from the dealership. They will "goodwill" things for your.....Dodge pays for the parts, dealership pays for labor, and you pay a deductable(can range usually from $50-$300, depends on the repairs actual cost). For the guys who never bring their car in for maintance(tranny flushes, oil changes, 4x4 services, tune-ups, p/s flushes, EFI cleaning, etc) they are much less likely to get "goodwill" after they are out of warrenty. Why should the dealership/dodge help you if you haven't helped them? Sometimes its worth spending a few bucks to maintane your car at a dealership. Just depends on how much you can fix on your own. I really doubt changing your oil every 5000 miles will void your warrenty. If your really paranoid do what Mike said and keep all your fluid and filter reciepts. And document your maintance mileage. Guy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 thanks for the tips guys. Well... about 3000 mile or 5000 mile... again, I BARELY if at all qualify for any of Dodges 'requirement's that put me in the 3000 mile schedule, so I'm thinking 5000 mile would be fine for me... My main concern is I just don't want to have to argue this point with them if something goes wrong. Not just oil changes, but the other maintanance items too, like checking belt tension, rotating tires, checking exhaust system etc. Agreed, there probably arent' very many warranty items I could possibly deal with that they could say "well you didn't do your oil changes every 3000 so it's YOUR fault!" but they might get me on some of those other items as being possibly related. I probably will take the car to the dealership for service to be sure they hit all the points recommended in the manual like what was mentioned above. And again, to help with stuff like 80LT1 said... keep on their good side and hopefully they help me out... I dunno... it will be pricey (all the more reason I'd rather do it every 5000 instead of 3000) but seems to have some advantages... but I want to feel out the vibe with the guys at the dealership where I bought the car too and see if they're cool or just d**** right off the bat, they no reason to take them my business. But yeah, count on me keeping every reciept for every tiny little thing. In the meantime, as long as they can't deny me any kind of warranty coverage for sticking to a 5000 mile sched. instead of 3000 mile, that's what I"m going to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moridin Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 Just to show the other side of that coin, when I worked for a Volvo dealer we had a guy with a 740 Turbo who had 750,000 miles on his car and always had the oil changed at 5000. Dino oil not synthetic too. You get up above a certain mileage (think it's 300,000) and Volvo sends you a little badge for your grille. This guy had a couple... That's interesting...I'll have to tell my friend and his dad. I did forget to mention that my friend beats the living piss out of everything he drives. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pop N Wood Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 I probably will take the car to the dealership for service to be sure they hit all the points recommended in the manual like what was mentioned above. And again' date=' to help with stuff like 80LT1 said... keep on their good side and hopefully they help me out...[/quote'] Well why don't you just mail them a check every month or two and give them money for no reason? I know I would like you if you sent me money. Do you really think they are going to refuse to fix your broken power window or fouled O2 sensor just because you didn't pay them money to check your belt tension? If it comes down to replacing your transmission or losing an oil change customer for life, then I hate to say which option a disreputable dealer is going to take. Dodge has certain legal obligations here. I have only known a hand full of people who ever complained about being denied warrantee service. All of those were because the dealership claimed there was nothing wrong (an intermittent problem or some type of noise) or because the part broke 3 days after the warrantee ran out. My neighbors Chrysler minivan and a buddy's Dodge Durango both did just exactly that. If you are this worried about the car breaking, then you should have bought a model you trusted more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikelly Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 I don't think it has to do with model or brand... Do a search and you'll find every make has horror stories about warranty "issues" and they're all the same... Money money money... Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 YEP! A very close friend of mine bought a brand new Altima about four months ago... has quite a few problems in only 6000 miles!! A BAD steering wheel shake at around 40mph, a trunk that won't close properly, and a couple small problems with interior like a center console lid that is stuck open. I've heard some BAD 350z stories as well... I have really been surprised. Anyways, true I trust Dodge a bit less than I would Nissan or Toyota, but that's not what this is about. (then again quite a few people over at srtforums.com with 30-40-50k miles + and having NO problems and they ALL admit to driving their cars hard and very few of them are bone stock). This is about Dodge almost FORCING me to do 3000 mile oil changes, or basically saying that CERTAIN problems may not be covered under warranty if they can at all be linked to me not getting said 3k oil changes. So I just want to know that legally they can't deny me warranty service AT ALL if I do my oil changes at 5000 instead of 3000 miles. Even if some failure occurs like major engine component or the turbocharger, where they could say "well it failed because you didn't change your oil"... I want to be sure they CAN"T say something like that just because I did 5000 miles maintanance instead of 3000. With 3yr/36k mile bumper to bumper and 7yr/70k mile on most components I'm not too worried about the reliability though, as long as i don't have to have it in the shop all the time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 That's interesting...I'll have to tell my friend and his dad. I did forget to mention that my friend beats the living piss out of everything he drives. The guy with the 750,000 lived in San Luis Obispo and drove back and forth from LA to SF so his was almost exclusively Highway 101 miles FWIW. Still, 750,000 and the head had never been off the block. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparks280zt Posted October 19, 2005 Share Posted October 19, 2005 Hey my dad has 2,200,000.00 on one of his Kenworths, does that count??? jk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
randy 77zt Posted October 20, 2005 Share Posted October 20, 2005 as a dealer tech at a ford dealer i have only seen warrenty claims denied for obvious stupidity.like a motor in a lincoln ls that had 28000 miles on it with NO oil changes.it still had grey painted oil filter on it.and a ton of sludge.or transmissions in diesel pickups with propane injection.so if you blow a trans at the drag strip and forget to clean out the rubber in the front fenders you deserve to pay for your damage.if you hydro-lock your motor with a cold air intake in the rain and forget to put the oem filter system back on your stupid. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
b__sosick Posted October 20, 2005 Share Posted October 20, 2005 If your car requires a "cold air intake" your probably stupid anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikelly Posted October 20, 2005 Share Posted October 20, 2005 Well there is a whole slew of stories out there. Dodge makes me nervous based on how they are allowing Mitsubishie to hound guys with the EVO8, and wholesale voiding any warranties for people tracking their cars... It is absolutely crazy... I know there are a LOT of horror stories on the diesel truck forums about all kinds of stupidity! B_Sosick, Lot of guys on here are runing CAIs of one form or another... Guess they are stupid? Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bastaad525 Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 yeah what was up with that comment about cold air intakes?? My Z has a K&N filter out front of the radiator support... that counts as a CAI no? thought that was a SMART move not a stupid one anyways, I'm not putting a CAI on the SRT, from what I understand it doesn't make much power, the way the stock intake is setup it already draws cold air from outside the engine bay anyways. I actually really like the way Dodge designed a lot of things on this car. For instance, the stock filter... it's JUST like a K&N can-shaped filter! It looks exactly like one except for it's yellow and made of paper. But it attaches to the stock intake tube exactly the same way, meaning you can just go buy a K&N and pop it on there with no fuss, no needing to hit home depot for custom PVC pipes errr I mean... some stainless mandrel bends Or another thing, that functional scoop in the nose, dumps cold air right over the turbo charger, but on the underside of the hood, there is a hollow bulge that also splits off from the path of the cold air from that scoop, and if you cut out that bulge, it would dump cold air right over the air filter. The filter is enclosed in a box like any factory car these days, but you could just take the lid off and then have an even colder and more direct source of air to the filter. Lots of little things on the car like that that are just very well thought out, you can tell the guys who designed this thing were car guys and performance guys Anyways... totally off topic, I know As far as mods like a cold air intake or whatever, I'm going to try to stick to the mopar catalog for mods, so hopefully that won't mess with warranty stuff much. Some dealerships can be pretty screwed up about it but I hear there are a couple dealerships local to me that fully support these cars and all the mopar mods and wont void anything if they see the car full of mopar parts. The good news is that almost everything you could want to upgrade on the car is covered in the mopar catalog, I've heard very good things about the upgrades from those who've bought them, and they are actually all priced VERY reasonably as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
240ZR Posted October 21, 2005 Share Posted October 21, 2005 Just to show the other side of that coin, when I worked for a Volvo dealer we had a guy with a 740 Turbo who had 750,000 miles on his car and always had the oil changed at 5000. Dino oil not synthetic too. You get up above a certain mileage (think it's 300,000) and Volvo sends you a little badge for your grille. This guy had a couple... I had my 400k and 500k onea on my P1800 I loved that car, untill it was stolen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.