Quote:
Originally Posted by oldman
Must mean M (money) x 3
I've just recently changed my oil at 5,000Km. Figured that seeing the first service interval has been reduced to 15,000Km, I would do my own
at 5,000 and 10,000 and then the dealer service at 15,000 then back to me at at 20,000. You get the picture.
I was going to go to the dealer, but after he quoted me $240 to do it, I thought I would do the change myself. After all, it's not rocket science. I did ask what oil they use so he brought out a 1 litre bottle of "Castrol SLX Professional BMW LL01" @ $29.00 a litre.
I rang around and got a quote from Supercheap Auto for 20 litre drum @ $245.00 so I ordered it and it arrived from Melbourne the next day.
Bottom line is I will get 3 oil changes for my $245.00 @ 6.5 litres per time + $34 each for filters x 3. Total cost $347 vs $720 at the dealer.
A saving of close to $375 or half price just for a bit of my time. I wasn't any big deal to do either. I found the oil cap could be removed
by hand without any filter removal tools as could the reverse on tightening it right up to where the green markers line up. I'm 58 and certainly not Superman so I wonder if others have found they could also do it by hand.
The engine plug to drain was also easy to undo and my crush washer ended up in the drain pan as well but it was easy to see that it had gone somewhere due to the fact that the drain plug facia was like shiny aluminium and the crush washer is copper.
Also, I used cut out top off a ice cream container in a concave around the drain plus so oil does not run out all over the floor pan as I could see that was definitely going to happen. Old oil was black, but was clean as I could actually see right through it against the sunlight whilst it was draining.
I have a set of old fashioned Castrol oil bottles if you know what I mean. The ones with the screw on funnel type tops with caps. Two of them are 1 litre and 1/2 litre measures so it was easy the do the 6.5 litres except that I had to be very carefull to know how many I had already added so I marked each one off on a piece of paper.
I did use exactly 6.5 litres because that's what it says in the BMW TIS for the N54 as "Oil change volume with oil filter 6.5 litres"
Car started up fine and checked for leaks, checked the oil level through the iDrive as all is well. Without going anywhere, it came up to max within a few minutes.
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Nice one Oldman. I bought a specific filter removal tool from the states (about $15 I think) but could probably have loosened by hand with a rag over the top. Good tip with the ice cream container. New crush washer for the sump in the filter kit so don't worry about losing the old one.
