How often should you service your car?
Whichever comes first. That phrase in your logbook is doing a lot of work.
Your car's service interval is set by the manufacturer in both kilometres and months, and whichever one arrives first is the one that applies. Short trips and stop start driving shorten oil life faster than distance suggests, and a car that sits still still ages its fluids. Service One Automotive at Factory 9, 266 Osborne Avenue, Clayton South VIC 3169 services to manufacturer schedules. Ring 0434 949 091.
Start with your own logbook
There is no single correct interval. It is set per engine by the people who built it, and it varies enormously between a small petrol engine, a turbo diesel and a hybrid.
So the honest answer to how often you should service your car begins with opening the book that came with it. What follows is about the part the book cannot know, which is how you actually drive.
Why time matters as much as distance
Engine oil does not only wear out from use. It oxidises, it picks up combustion by products, and it collects moisture that condenses inside the engine every time it cools down.
A car doing five thousand kilometres a year in short local trips can have oil in worse condition than a car that did twenty thousand on the freeway. The odometer is not measuring the thing that matters.
The short trip problem
An engine only starts burning off the moisture and fuel that collect in the oil once it is thoroughly warm, and thoroughly warm takes longer than the temperature gauge suggests.
A drive from Clayton South to the shops and back may never get there. Do that as your main pattern of driving and the oil is working in the worst conditions it ever sees, every single trip.
Many manufacturers recognise this with a severe conditions schedule, which is usually a shorter interval. Most people driving in severe conditions do not realise they qualify, because it sounds like it means towing across the desert rather than the school run.
What about the car that barely moves?
Service it on time. All the fluids age in place, rubber perishes, and brake fluid absorbs moisture out of the air whether or not the wheels turn.
Timing belts are the clearest example, because they carry a replacement interval in years as well as in kilometres, and on most engines a belt failure is catastrophic rather than inconvenient.
A simple way to decide
Take your manufacturer's interval as the ceiling, not the target. If your driving is mostly short, mostly urban, or the car spends days at a time parked, treat the severe conditions figure as yours.
If you are unsure which applies to your car, ring and tell us the make, model and how you actually use it. That conversation is free.
Quick answers
Is the six months or 10,000 kilometres rule still right?
It is a rough old rule of thumb that suits some cars and is wrong for others. Modern engines with long life oils often run longer intervals, and some run shorter. The book is the answer.
Does the service light in the dash know when I need a service?
On many newer cars it is a genuine calculation based on how the engine has been run. On plenty of others it is just a counter that lights up at a set distance. Worth knowing which one you have.
Can I go a bit over?
A little over is not a disaster. Making a habit of it is, because the damage is gradual and invisible until it is not.
Need it looked at?
Ring the workshop, or send a booking request.
Open weekends by booking only, at the same rates. The booking has to be confirmed before the day, so ring or text ahead.