Perhaps you have experienced it, you have received your new car and you receive a whole stack of booklets. Once you get home, browse through it but don’t pay too much attention to it. Or maybe you have already browsed through the booklets before purchasing. The point I want to go to is whether you have also checked whether the maintenance book of the car is present. Even more important is whether you have also checked whether the booklet has been completed. And especially HOW?
Would you like to know what you can find in the maintenance booklet for Car Servicing Reading and what you should pay attention to? In this article we are going to talk about the things that are often described in the maintenance booklet. Furthermore, I would like to tell you what is important to check and I will give some tips that you can use when checking the maintenance booklet.
How do you recognize the maintenance book of the car?
The maintenance booklet of the car, you hear a lot about it, but how do you recognize it? When a car is delivered new, it often comes with a folder with various booklets. To begin with, here is the manual for the car. Depending on the brand and the choice of the manufacturer, there may be additional manuals in the folder for possible options. As a final manual, a number of flyers are often supplied on which a short instruction / manual can be found for the basic functions of the car.
In addition to the manuals, a somewhat thinner booklet is often included. This booklet is filled with all available brand dealers. You can find the available dealers per country with the necessary contact information. This can be useful if you get stranded with your car somewhere where no mobile internet is available.
Now the booklet that matters, the maintenance booklet. Usually this is also a thinner booklet and sometimes there is a technical image on the front cover. You can think of an image of a part of the car or one that has to do with engine oil or something else related to maintenance.
Make sure you check your number plates
Dirty number plates can lead to hefty fines as the law prohibits not having a clear view to make out all characters on the plate. Make sure you check your plate and be sure that it’s not impeded by any grime, dirt, scrapes or dents. If it is, be sure to look at trying to get a set of replacement number plates
Maintenance performed
It is the intention that after each maintenance carried out, the activities are recorded and signed off in the maintenance booklet. In the past, there were often three choices that could be made to fill in the maintenance performed. You could opt for a small or a major service and often there was still the choice for an annual check. The maintenance schedule indicated which activities had to be carried out with which choice.
After the choice had been made for a certain service, a mileage and date had to be entered on which the maintenance was performed. Finally, there was still room for a stamp of the executive company. Some mechanics also initial the stamp.
Nowadays it is more and more common to spread maintenance work. A small or a major Car Servicing Reading is less and less prescribed by manufacturers. On the other hand, maintenance is chosen on the basis of condition. This means that the individual maintenance periods are considered. These separate maintenance periods can now also be found in the maintenance booklet. For each section for the work performed, all maintenance matters can be chosen separately from each other.
Maintenance schedule
For each type of car there is a schedule drawn up by the manufacturer for the execution of the maintenance. It is not the case that all wearing parts or, for example, all filters have to be replaced with every maintenance. An engine air filter lasts much longer than the engine oil filter. In the maintenance schedule you will find what the interval is for replacing certain parts or which parts need maintenance.
Electronic Vehicle Service Book
In recent years, the paper maintenance booklet has become less and less. Due to the technological developments of new cars, more and more vehicles are fitted with an entertainment system with a screen as standard. In these cars you will find the maintenance booklet more and more digitally stored in the entertainment system of the vehicle. When maintenance has been carried out on the car, this is stored with a computer in the car and processed in the electronic maintenance book of the car.
So if you can’t find the maintenance booklet in a paper version and the car has an entertainment system with a screen. Also check whether a digital booklet is available in which the maintenance performed is registered.
Today we see a shift from the previous schedule to maintenance based on condition. An example of such a scheme could be:
Change engine oil and filter every 30,000 km, why change the engine oil?
- Replace spark plugs every 2nd oil change
- Replace air filter and fuel filter with every 3rd oil change
- Replace cabin filter during every oil change
- Perform overall vehicle check every 60,000 km
