Newbie Oil Change question. I bought my 04 MCS at a Acura dealer's used car lot and they may have changed the oil with nonsynthetic. Don't know. Think that could technically void the warranty. Do I have to wait til the service light to go on to ask Mini to service the car? It has 17K on it.

 

you should wait until the service indicator counts down to under 1000 miles. if your not sure of what this is, when you turn on your car look at the odometer and the service countdown should be on there. at 17k, if the car was decently maintained by the previous owner, then you should be coming up on your next official (read: free) service from your local MINI dealership. as for the non-synthetic, what are your reasons for thinking they wouldn't put synthetic in? i would think that there would be a note in their books that says MINI's need synthetic. i can't see how that would void your warranty if that wasn't the case tho. hope i was able to answer your questions

 

Non-synthetic oil won't void the warranty. This would only happen if it could be proven that they used such an inferior product (like, say, maple syrup) that it directly resulted in engine damage and required repairs. Non-synthetic oil isn't going to damage the engine, it's just not going to facilitate the 10-15k oil change intervals that MINI recommends. So, I'd change it out for peace of mind, since you've got around 8k left until the next service, and non-synthetic won't do the job for that long, but don't worry about the warranty.

Congrats on the car!
Chris