I'm sure we all have had interesting experiences with dealerships, I had my own a few days ago and i thought it would be worth posting.

I recently moved to germany and brought my 8 with me. Let me just say the autobahn is a blast and though iv'e yet to go to nurburgring I hope to do so soon. Anyway, when my vehicle first got here I had the local dealer change the oil/ do whatever maintence they do (total cost of 80 Euro and that was with supplying my own oil and filter, their oil alone was 12 Euro per quart, non-synthetic). I could easily change the oil myself but I am afraid that mazda will try to pull some BS with my extended warranty if i dont have proper maintence records from an "authorized" service location or whatever, I had an issue like that with my honda. So fast forward to 4,000 miles later (yes im lazy), I come to the dealer agian for my second change and they tell me i dont have to come in for another 3,000 miles????????? I looked at them like they were reterded and had em change the oil anyway. 7,000 miles? come on mazda...seriously

 

if u drive on highway a lot, you dont have to change your oil as often.

but if u drive in city a lot, tons of stop & go red light traffic, oil dies off much faster

so depends on ur condition, 7000 miles MIGHT BE ok.

 

yeah depends on the style of driving so 7k is ok if its mostly highway

 

one more thing, Synthetic oil has significantly longer life than regular oil.

so if u had Synthetic in there and mostly highway, u should be ok.

 

The manual says every 7k for normal driving and every 5k for more intense driving.

 

well, germany does seem to have alot less stop and go traffic. I was using 5W-20 before, I just switched to 5W-30. I am considering going synthetic, I have read the threads regarding synthetics but I still cand decise what weight to use.

 

how cold does it get around ramstein... fairly mild winters yeah??

i'm using 10w40 here still, that prolly wont change when i get to belgium....

 

so change this one yourself then go in in another 3000 and you'll be back on schedual.

 

it was pretty cold but anything is cold compared to Hawaii temps. I dobn think it got below 15F so why 5W40? synthetic or natural?

 

My previous car Peugeot 206cc the dealership told me that i must go for a refill if any at 20k !! and 40k for the change.... Full synthetic but still this was France weather not for my country.

 

dino oil for now(GTX).... synthetic soon though. i'll prolly just swap when i install the Sohn adapter and inject 2-stroke. wont be any fun though cause i intend to drain ALL the oil, including the coolers.

and because it doesnt get cold enough there(or here) to justify using anything less than 10w40

 

Does the warranty on US bought vehicles still apply if you take the car overseas? I have friends who are in the military and took their Mazda 3 to Turkey and as far as I know their warranty is void.

Just curious.

 

Rocks(OP) might be able to answer that now, but i am talking to mazda the last day or two about the same thing.... i'll post it up when i find out.

 

Use 5w30 or 5w40

I use 10w40, NYC will see freezing weather (14f coldest last year), or else I could've use 20w50.

 

i use 10w30. and yes, its 7,500 miles per oil change if its all highway driving. 5,000 if you drive a bit more spirited.

i change my oil every 3,000 - 3,500. because i pay the $40. if i were paying 80 euro ($125) i'd change my oil every 7,500 too.

also, just as long as you show mazda the receipts of your oil and filter purchases, they cant pull any bs on you.

 

40 bucks for an oil change i change that stuff myself and it's like $12 for 5 qt of oil and like $3.xx for a filter....that's like 15 or 16 dollars!!!!

 

Yes, the owner's manual does say every 7500 miles. I usually change every 4-5k miles as my driving is all in town and very spririted.

 

just a thought. Could they have been confused and while you were speaking in Miles they were thinking Kilometers?

 

^^i'm gonna laugh and remember why your name is "Rocks" if thats the case rofl

^^ Rotten42, your amp goes to eleven, lol

 

Are we talking about Synthetic or Regular?

Regular oil change cost 20 bux in my area, including 5 qts of oil and some el-cheapo filter, labor included.

If I buy regular oil & good filter + change it myself, it will cost 12.99. Autozone special.

Synthetic double the amount.

 

3k miles is an outdated bunch of bs on an engine that doesn't requre a few fresh quarts in between oil cange intervals.

You are wasting your time and money if you change your oil every 3k.

I usually do it roughly every 5k. If I was a road warrior highway miling machine I wouldn't hesitate to stretch to 7500 miles.

 

3K is fine for most. 5K is a good number. but if u want to give your car the best, 3K is a pretty good starting point. hell I change my oil every 1.5-2.5K miles. go figure

 

And the places you change it at put the oil in their cars... seriously, 3k miles was a profiteering scheme way back when, now it's bordering on absurd. There is no drawback to 5k or 3 months, whichever happens first. I've seen my oil at 5k, it's really not all that bad.

 

I use RP 5w30 and just changed it last week after 5500 miles and the oil looked pretty damn good. Yea its synthetic so it prob should look good but hey, my car is an 04 with 55K miles on it with compression of 8.3 (ave.) in rotor one and 8.0 in rotor 2 at 245 rpms (had it checked last week due to radiator repair at dealership), so something is working

 

I change my own oil btw.

the price I said is what most people charge around here. I past by one of those gas station everyday. thats what the price tag says.