When is my E39's Birthday?

Dear Folks, In response to an earlier post about fluid level, John mentioned the

4year/50,000 mile warranty. My 2003 530i was manufactured in November of 2002 and sold to the first owner in the US in May of 2003. It had a Level I inspection at 28,000 miles in September of 2005 and currently has 37,000 miles.

Should I request a Level II inspection in November of this year (4 years since the car was manufactured) or wait until the warranty is about to expire?

Also, will my dealer actually perform a Level II inspection if the service indicator doesn't say it's needed? (I'm still getting three green bars on the service indicator.) Thanks to everyone's help, I did change the oil myself in June at 35K.

I really appreciate everyone's advice.

Ambrose

You're obviously within the 50K/4 year "free" (nothing is) maintenance which SHOULD be transferable to the new owner (you).

The service interval is based on total fuel consumption (a good approximation of your vehicles usage ... city/highway miles, start cycles, etc). With the 530i, that should be roughly a service interval of 15,000 -

16,500 miles.

1st service - Oil service

2nd service - Insp 1 (Includes oil service) 3rd service - Oil service 4th service - Insp 2 (oil service) and so on

If inspection 1 occurred at 28K, you should expect to do oil service at roughly 28+15 = 43K. I'd recommend doing an oil change twice as often, say every 7.5K, so yours at 35K isn't necessarily a bad thing. I wouldn't think you'd need an Inspection 2 just yet. Your free maintenance is based on the service indicator lights. I'd guess you have two or three green lights still illuminated if they were reset at 28K.

You definitely want to have any outstanding issues resolved on the car before your 4 years are up (looks like that will happen prior to 50K). Start recording any issues with the car (wiper condition, systems operation etc) and make sure they're all attended to prior to May 2007.

You should have a warrantee and service handbook with the car. This describes the service, the actual procedures involved, etc.

R / John