How critical is 6000 mile service interval?

[rwbloch]

I just bought an '09 RT, and was wondering how critical is it to stick religiously to the 6,000 mile service interval. The reason I ask is that I am planning an 8,000 mile ride next summer and will inevitably be "on the road" somewhere when the bike turns 6,000 miles.

 

With my Ducati, the conventional wisdom was that you could go 7-9,000 mile between services once you got past the first 6,000 mile service.

 

Should I do my first 6,000 mile service at close to 6,000 miles or is there some slack?

 

Thanks,

 

RB

[Silver Surfer/AKAButters]

It is critical from a warranty perspective. If you can document that you have had the required service performend by a qualified individual, that should suffice. If however you had 8K on the clock without required service and had a major failure, you would probably have a tough time having it repared under warrant if the failure was related to an itme that required attention at the 6K.

 

Personally I would be at a minimum, changing my oil prior to that.

[rglassma]

If you consider what is being done at the 6K service, the most important items in my opinion are:

 

oil / filter change - 6K is a long time

valve check and/or adjust - nature of the boxer engine

throttle body sync - nature of the boxer engine

 

Warranty a side (and I agree with the previous post for sure!!), If the valves need adjusting, you are flirting with danger. If the throttle bodies need to be synced, the engine will not be running as smoothly as it should be. That of course will affect you on a long trip, right??

 

I would work it into the trip at a dealer on the way.

[T__]

I just bought an '09 RT, and was wondering how critical is it to stick religiously to the 6,000 mile service interval. The reason I ask is that I am planning an 8,000 mile ride next summer and will inevitably be "on the road" somewhere when the bike turns 6,000 miles.

 

With my Ducati, the conventional wisdom was that you could go 7-9,000 mile between services once you got past the first 6,000 mile service.

 

Should I do my first 6,000 mile service at close to 6,000 miles or is there some slack?

 

Thanks,

 

RB

 

 

 

RB, if your bike had a lot more miles on it I wouldn’t worry at all.. But seeing as your 09 RT has very low miles now you probably should keep an eye on the valve adjustment until you get some more miles on it.. Usually after the 2nd or 3rd valve adjustment they don’t seem change much after that..

 

About all I would personally worry about is the valve adjustment (check) & oil change..

 

You can probably get away with a valve lash check before the trip & after the trip or just stop in a BMW dealer on the trip at about 5-7,000 miles & have the valves checked & the oil changed while on the road.. Most BMW dealers will work you right in without an appointment if you are away from home & on a trip..

 

Twisty

 

[johnlt]

The first service is the most important of any service. Do it early, especially the oil/filter. I'd also do valves and re-torque the heads on a new bike. I always change my oil at <1000 on a new bike even though its not required. Oil is cheap and the first oil change washes out a lot of mfg filings and "wear in" stuff. IMO

[rwbloch]

Thanks all for the input. Sounds very much like the recommended procedure with the Duc.

 

RB

[TomfromMD]

Since RT tire mileage seems to be in the 5,000~8,000 mile range, it might be advantageous to combine your 6k service with the fitting of replacement tires. This may require some advance planning & phone calls to dealers, but has worked for me in the past.

Tom

[motorman587]

Went to Alaska and back, with one set of tires and no oil change. This was on an LT and no problems. Round trip was 12K. shhhhhhhhhhhh in case I sell the LT.

[smiller]

With my Ducati, the conventional wisdom was that you could go 7-9,000 mile between services once you got past the first 6,000 mile service.

You should perform maintenance as per BMW's recommendations during the warranty period, but beyond that most have noted little or no change in valve clearances once the oilhead/hexhead engines have broken in. At that point you can easily go to 12,000 mile intervals.

[SWB]

Another factor: I think your Beemer runs dino oil too, for the first 6K miles. If it was syn oil, I'd worry less. I still change the syn oil on all my vehicles by about 4K miles, because all you need is a problem with the intake system or air clearer, and your "perfectly fine" 10K syn oil turns into "perfectly fine liquid sandpaper".

 

My Uncle had a friend who was a Mobil engineer involved with development of the original Mobil 1 formula. They had run tests to 50K and 60K miles on the SAME oil with no measurable break down or particulate increase. But that was controlled conditions. I think the truth of the synthetic oil is that it's engineered to outlast other, equally critical systems in your vehicle that unfortunately, can corrupt good syn oil with 3K miles on it.

 

Because of this, the only time I put syn oil and left it to say, 15K miles, was when I loaned my almost new pickup truck to my daughter to take to college. I KNEW it wouldn't be serviced properly, so I put in Mobil 1 and the best air filtration system I could find.

 

So, yeah, it's a no brainer - have the bike serviced early but not late.

 

- Scott