10,000 miles ??? My dealer said 10,000 miles. I've heard of others Mini owners being told 7,500 miles for their first service/oil change. Any thoughts/comments? Thx- Bob

 

Mine was 1yr or 10k miles, which ever came first. And they would not do it (for free) 1 day prior to the 1yr. Only had 8500mi on it at the time.

 

10,000 miles isn't a hard figure, it is an estimate. The oil service should be done when the oil service indicator has counted back to "0". (The indicator comes on for a few seconds at start-up where the odomoter readout is). Many dealers will do the service anytime between "500" and "0".

My first oil service is tomorrow the car has a little over 11,000 and the oil service is showing "-250". The oil service indicator counts down in 25's and is based mainly on fuel consumption, I believe. It doesn't actually 'read' the oil. I changed my oil at 5,000 for example, but the car doesn't know that!

One other note, dealers will change your oil at one year even if you haven't reached "0" as per the recommendation in the service schedule.

 

just read the lil ole manual that came with the car. Yeah sure, you betcha it's as easy as that. Read the manual and all will be revealed. Read the manual and you learn everything(well mostly) you need to know. Read the manual and these little nagging questions you have to wait for someone to answer on the internet will be answered quicker than you can say "real the manual". :-) Did I mention that you might want to consider reading the manual?

 

This has been discussed to death, but one more post can't hurt

It seems most dealers will only do the minimum that BMW will pay for, in this case what ever the computer tells them. My dealer (who rocks ) specifically recommends every 5,000 miles wether it's changed by them, an independant shop, or by myself...
WHY 5k instead of 10k.. because the oil hasn't changed over the last few years, the filters haven't the engines haven't.. so what has??? The manufactures paying for it has, and they will do the minimum to keep the car in check for the life of the warranty. Outside of warranty any repairs are on your dime, and they want as many of your dimes as they can get.. Take a look at 10,000 mile oil, you really want that sludge in your engine? Not to mention the filter isn't filtering too well anylonger. Assuming you have the dealer do the 5k oil change just ask yourself, is $85 very 6 month or so worth the peace of mind that you're doing good for your engine? It is to me...

whew, damn starbucks coffee..

 

Actually, it really isn't necessary to change the oil in a MINI very often. Once a year should be sufficient. Our MINIs use synthetic oil. There are much less impurities in the oil so it doesn't gum up your engine insides as much.
Most other cars that have a 5000kms oil change interval use regular oil.
Synthetic oil is also more slippery than regular oil. It is also more costly.

The only probable concern is that the oil filter does its job.

If it is your first oil change, my dealer, and many others would recommend a separate oil change only, just after break in. That's because the first 2000 kms or so, your engine is developing a wear pattern. When this first oil change is done, the dealer should NOT reset your service interval.

Some of the higher end cars now have actual oil life monitoring. That is, the engine has sensors that actually measure the quality of oil in your car and calulculate when to change the oil. They have found the oil change indicator certainly does not come up every 3 months or 5000 miles.

 

mine is currently at 11700 and i havent had my first oil change. it tells me i need 1300 more miles... quite a bit more than 10,000 but i'm not worried

apparently its "in the manual" =P

 

I previously had a BMW that also used synthetic oil, and also told you (via a oil service light) when to change the oil. I had the car for 140,00 miles, and averaged about 8,000-9,000 miles between oil changes.

-from another Bob in PA

 

My first oil change was at 12,500 miles, and I had 500 miles to go according to the service indicator. Brought 5 qts of Redline oil to the dealership for them to use. My engine feels/runs perfectly.

Many people say that BMW wants to do the minimum amount of maintenence to get through the warranty period. But think about it like this: Many people expect their cars to last for a long time, well beyond the 4year/50000mile warranty period. I expect mine to easily last 150,000-200,000 miles while FOLLOWING BMWs SERVICE INTERVALS.

If my MINI doesn't last as long as I expect it should, then I will no longer buy a MINI or a BMW. I don't think they want to lose customers this way, so I assume they care about how long and well their engines last.

BTW my last car (1988 BMW 325i convertible) lasted 230,000 miles, ran flawlessly, and all I did was follow BMW's recommended service.

 

The indicator is based on gas usage, nothing fancy like monitoring the actual oil quality. We do ours at approx 5k on our syth cars (as well as an earlier post break in one) and the oil is really disgusting- better to change it and be good to the car I say.

(on a side note our Minis do tend to run quite rich, not sure if this will effect the oil)

 

I'm in complete agreement.

 

i think my service advisor said it was based on how long your trips are and how often you drive...

he was trying to explain why mine kept gaining mileage. for one, it sat undriven for 3 months (tragic, i know) and i drive in 30 miles commute trips everyday.

apparently that means i dont need and oil change til 12,500

 

According to my service level meter or whatever it is called, I'll be at 11,300 miles for my 1st oil change. Most of our miles are freeway miles, so we've seen the indicator gradually climb over the past 10,000 miles. I'll probably do changes myself every 5000 miles with Mobil 1 after the first free change though.

 

I just changed mine today for the first time. Just over 2,000 miles. I'll probably do it again at 6,000 miles or so. After the first freebie from the dealer I'll settle into a every 5,000 miles routine. By the way the MINI is a very easy car to change the oil on.

 

This may have been discussed many times before on the board, but as an expectant owner I appreciate hearing every one's experiences here. I plan on changing mine earlier on the first time also. I also hadn't heard that changing the oil on the MINI was very easy, in fact somehow had it in my head that it was hard, so this is great news. Thanks.

 

When I got my 2001 330ci, I still changed the oil and filter after 1500 miles without having the computer reset to think it had been done. The next oil change came at about 10,000 miles per the computer.

No matter how perfect a manufacturer tries to be, there will always be machining bits left and after about 1500 miles, they should be caught in the filter and oil. They car today has almost 90,000 miles on it and has never had an internal engine problem, although it does need a quart of oil added every month.

 

Not to hijack, but do you have a Purple Haze MCS born on 4/20?

 

Yep,,, born and in limbo,,, dont know for sure if its on the boat or not... ASK-MINI and MINI USA say enroute,,, WW is not showing loaded on the ship that left Friday... I guess my mini is either having a last pint of Guiness in the mother country or catching the ocean breeze on the sun deck.

 

i agree 100%...there has always been a lot of discussion about how often to change oil/filter...even seen some recommend just the filter at 5K intervals and oil at 15K...but who pays for it is why the warranty only covers at around 10K (15K for BMW).

i just sold a 2001 BMW 330Ci with 66K miles...i changed the oil/filter every 5K. I still have a 1987 735i (had it since 90K)...change it every 5K and it has over 250K. 1999 VW passat...every 5K and it is 150K miles. personally, i think it is pretty cheap insurance.... my $0.02 worth....

when our 2006 MCS arrives, you can bet we'll follow break-in process and the oil will not see much past 5K for as long as we own the car....

 

probably smoking a joint, lol.

 

They tried to tell me I had to wait until around 15k miles or 1 year, but I was at 5,700 miles and just a little over 1 year, so they just changed it for me. They did not reset the monitor, but listed it in the paperwork as "time based."

 

My MA told me to not even bother calling in to D&R here in Indy to have the oil changed untill the Indicator is below 100 miles. I have just under 4750 to go.

 

There are many, many threads on this and about every MINI forum that exists. Two camps, change it often vs follow MINIs direction.

I've discovered that new Porsches dont have an oil change for 20,000 miles ... MINI is about 10K on average.

Maybe the German engineers know something we dont and 3K oil changes are a thing of the past.

 

What we need to do is to poll the people who has over 100,000 miles on their MINI, and do what they do.