Hi I have studied the maintenance book quite a bit.
I am confident I can do everything beside adjusting valves or timing belt. The fluid changes, I am comfortable with.

I bought the car because of the good warranty. So I want to know how do I proof I have changed the oil on time and tranny fluid things like that? Do I take a video of myself changing the fluid or something? Receipts I will keep, but I normally order 6 filters at a time.

I drive a little less than the book says, guessing maybe 6-7k a year, so I will be going by the time interval for many things.

In a CA car doing mostly highway, can I follow the regular schedule? Although I don't mind changing the tranny every 24 months. Something is amiss with the regular schedule because it never mention "Change manual transaxle oil" for regular..

It's way rather intensive for a car that doesn't drive 10k a year to follow the severe schedule, because when you are draining the oil at 3 months the oil might only have done 2k miles!

 

By the way does anyone know if the GT come with synthetic from the factory.


I don't plan to change to synthetic too early if it used dino oil for the factory fill. Afraid of break in issues with synthetic oil.

 

Vehicle comes with dino. The best advice is save the receipts for oil, filter, other fluids, etc. However your idea of a video is very good. Take a shot of the odometer showing the mileage, then a short video of draining the oil, fluid, etc and refilling it. With 6-7K a year an oil change every 6 months should be more than sufficient especially if you're using synthetic. Other than that following time interval rather than mileage should be fine.

The only concern on following regular than severe schedule would be heat or hilly roads if you happen to live in the Inland Empire. Even though Phoenix is flat I follow the severe schedule because of the heat.

 

Yes, this is the burden of the home mechanic trying to maintain their warranty.

I keep the receipt for the oil filter I purchase for each oil change as proof since it has a date on it usually the same day I'm doing the job - mileage just write down. Then you can bargain hunt for oil if you'd like - I just happen to buy oil by the case instead of the filters.

That being said your dealer will push back on some warranty things but how can they refuse replacing your radio if you haven't changed your oil by the schedule. The oil change needs to be the cause of the warranty work for them to refuse to pay for it - they'll know when they open up your engine if it has had proper oil changes.

 

Can I turn off the maintenance light myself or only dealer computer can do this?

 

you can turn it off if you want. there is a sticky that details how