Maintenance II?

[KE7WOX]

Well, my TB will need an oil change / servicing soon, and I got a letter from GM Goodwrench saying that the next maintenance is a Maintenance II.

Is it really necessary to follow this and take it to a GM place to have a Maintenance II? or will a regullar full service at Midas or a similar place suffice?

[The Roadie]

My advice, if you're not doing the work yourself for any reason (your tools were just stolen with no insurance, no place to park it except the street, you're recovering from ten broken bones, voices from the air told you not to work on it), never accept a "combined" service package from anybody unless they have a heck of a good coupon. Pick and choose, and even find a craigslist mechanic you can check recommendations for, and just do the things that need doing.

Dealer service packs or especially the "free oil change" coupons are just a way for them to get their mitts on the vehicle for a fishing expedition to sell you new seals (for merely wet, not dripping ones) and motor mounts. For some odd reason, motor mounts are this years version of blinker fluid.

Whether it's in or out of warranty, you're never required to take it to GM for the work. If it's in warranty, just keep receipts especially for oil changes.

As to what needs doing - it's all in the Owner's Manual. An offroading owner should be able to do 95% of these things anyway - else how are you going to be able to determine if something's safe to drive after an offroad incident? If you don't know what the suspension looks like when it's new, how can you tell when something's bent?

But there's hardly anything on the Maintenance II list that isn't covered by a decent (if the process even exists - there's so many cheaters) oil change place. But you have to watch them like a hawk.

Is there any major reason you aren't doing all this personally, to get to know the vehicle and its systems better?

[KE7WOX]

The main reason I'm not doing it is because of location. I live in the college dorms and none of the university parking lots around are leveled (now that I think about it, I think that all the parking lots in the city have some kind of slope), it's "illegal" to change the oil in university-controlled property, and I have pretty much no tools.


As of now, the main thing I will really watch about is the Dex-Cool, apparently when they changed the oil on my friend's STS they used an antifreeze that looks yellow, which is probably not Dex-Cool.


And no, I'm not taking it to Walmart Auto or Iffy Lube.