Maintenance Record

Read more of my VW Golf Mk 5 articles.

Mileage Date Type Description Cost
171,800 4th June 2016 Wear and Tear Fitted new rear driver's door lock module myself £21
170,000 23rd March 2016 Wear and Tear 4 new tyres £202
167,530 2nd December 2015 Wear and Tear 3rd battery fitted. Precautionary purchase of non-OEM 72Ah battery from advancedbatterysupplies.co.uk £50
164,400 12th June 2015 Regular servicing and Unexpected Repair Ninth (minor) Service including brake fluid change, air conditioning service and courtesy car, £258. Also bottom hose pipe connector to radiator replaced as found to be leaking, £132. £390
161,800 5th March 2015 Wear and Tear Timing Belt, Tensiorer, Water Pump, exhaust centre connecting sleave & free-wheel alternator pulley (FAP) replacement £511
158,200 30th October 2014 Wear and Tear Sticking rear brake calliper £630
154,300 13th May 2014 Wear and Tear Rear coil springs replaced and geometry check/adjustment. £290
146,000 19th July 2013 Regular servicing and Unexpected Repair Eighth (Inspection) Service including brake fluid change, £200 and replacement fuel filter housing, £160. Apparently the plastic internals of the fuel filter had disintegrated. Fuel Filter Housing Construction £360
144,000 21st May 2013 Wear and Tear New Rear Wheel Bearing and Wheel Speed sensor £300
142,900 25th April 2013 Wear and Tear New Front & Rear Brake Discs, Pads and Front Coil Springs £1,070
142,000 28th March 2013 Unexpected Repair part covered under Warranty Tailgate wiring loom replaced partly under warranty £110
139,500 11th October 2012 Unexpected Repair covered under Warranty Both front wings and sills replaced under warranty after rust spotted -
138,600 6th September 2012 Wear and Tear Fitted new Rear Wiper Arm myself £20
137,150 28th June 2012 Wear and Tear Small cooling fan replaced £230
137,000 19th June 2012 Wear and Tear Fitted new Driver's door lock module myself £123
136,700 6th June 2012 Wear and Tear 4 new tyres £262
134,200 28th February 2012 Wear and Tear Fitted new Bonnet catch myself £33
130,400 1st October 2011 Wear and Tear Puncture. Repaired £20
128,600 21st July 2011 Regular servicing Seventh Service including brake fluid change and courtesy car. £215
127,500 8th June 2011 Wear and Tear Pair new front wiper blades £30
125,000 18th March 2011 Unexpected Repair Wear on inside edge of all tyres. Re-alignment £60
  on-going Wear and Tear Oil Consumption  
124,800 8th March 2011 Wear and Tear Timing Belt & Tensioning Roller Replacement £300
120,600 22nd October 2010 Wear and Tear Fitted New Battery myself £71
117,250 23rd June 2010 Wear and Tear Air Conditioning Service £65
113,000 6th February 2010 Wear and Tear Puncture Repaired £20
  16 December 2009 Wear and Tear Rear Wiper Blade £6
110,500 1st September 2009 Regular servicing Sixth Service including brake fluid change and courtesy car. £155
107,268 11th June 2009 Unexpected Repair 2 new rear coil springs £140
107,122 6th June 2009 Wear and Tear 4 new tyres £243
91,500 22nd November 2007 Regular servicing and Unexpected Repair Fifth Service. Approx £160 for service and £100 for Intercooler Hose Replacement £260
79,000 20th March 2007 Wear and Tear Timing Belt Replacement £250
  2nd December 2006 Wear and Tear Key fob battery replacement (myself) £2
73,549 25th November 2006 Regular servicing

Fourth Service including brake fluid change.

£275
59,200 22nd May 2006 Wear and Tear New Front & Rear Wiper Blades & Dipped Headlight Bulbs £45
59,200 22nd May 2006 Unexpected Repair covered under Warranty Lighting ECU replaced under warranty  
55,000 8th April 2006 Unexpected Repair covered under Warranty Indicator repeater in nearside door mirror replaced under warranty -
54,725 1st April 2006 Regular servicing and Wear & Tear Third Service including headlight adjustment (a remnant from my first accident) and 4 new Michelin Pilot Primacy tyres. £190 for service & £260 for tyres after a special deal arrived at £450
53,900 12th March 2006 Unexpected Repair First Accident £100
52,000 18th February 2006 Unexpected Repair Windscreen replacement -
50,033 28th January 2006 Unexpected Repair covered under Warranty Inlet Manifold Flap replaced under warranty -
36,394 27th August 2005 Regular servicing Second Service. Paid for by Volkswagen after my complaint about incorrect maximum service interval quoted in literature. -
31,110 18th June 2005 Wear and Tear Stone in brakes £41
18,809 29th January 2005 Unexpected Repair covered under Warranty New handbrake cables fitted under warranty -
17,902 15th January 2005 Regular servicing and Unexpected Repair covered under Warranty First Service. Tandem Pump replaced under warranty at same time £220
16,940 4th January 2004 Wear and Tear Puncture. New Tyre £70
3,370 30th July 2004 Wear and Tear Puncture. Repaired £20
17 26th June 2004   Car new  
Total Maintenance Costs over 12 years and 171,800 miles (excluding miscellaneous sundries such as topup fluids, MOT fees, etc): £7,660

Nokian tyre cracking
Click on photo to enlarge.
4 New Tyres, 170,000 miles, 23rd March 2016
I had no real complaints with the Nokian V tyres I bought back in June 2012. After nearly 4 years, these tyres had been on my car the longest and had covered a respectable 34,000 miles. They still had an even 3mm of tread left on them all round (I rotate my car's tyres to even out wear on average every 18-24 months) and so I may have kept them longer if I hadn't noticed slight cracking around almost the whole circumferance of all tyres at the edge of the tread's contact area (see photo right). I wasn't comfortable driving on tyres like that so decided to replace them. I checked online but I couldn't beat 4 new Goodyear Efficient Grip Performance 195/65R15 tyres supplied & fitted by Kwik Fit for £202 all inc.
 
Timing Belt, Tensioner, Water Pump, Freewheel Pulley & Exhaust Connecting Sleeve, 161,800 miles, 5th March 2015
Timing Belt has to be replaced every 4 years and tensioner is always changed at same time. Also had water pump replaced at same time since it had never been replaced. £325 all inc including courtesy car.

After this work had been carried out the VW dealership carried out its usual Health Check which revealed a few other things. I usually take what they say with a pinch of salt but I let them replace the free-wheel alternator pulley (FAP) as it was noisey (£138) and the exhaust centre connecting sleeve as this was very rusty and almost disintegrating (£48). Rest of the original exhaust still going strong though!
 
Both rear coil springs replaced, 154,000 miles, 13th May 2014
Intermittent "clunking" noises going over speed bumps usually means only one thing: Damaged coil springs. But I wasn't 100% sure so I let an independent garage check things out. Sure enough, they had both broken off a piece near the bottom. They had been replaced 47,000 miles/5 years ago and so I guess that's not too bad. A check of the geometry found that the Right Rear Toe was out. I was told that this may have been caused by the damaged coil spring. Total repair cost: £290 all inc.
 
Small Cooling Fan replaced, 137,150 miles, 28th June 2012
This appears to be a fairly common fault. First thing you notice is the noise of the large cooling fan running at full speed to compensate for the lack of the small fan. No fault code is ever recorded. The solution appears easy enough. You just have to replace the small fan (VW part number W1K0 959 455 ES, approx £145 new from a VW dealer). Apparently this isn't a big job. You just need to unplug the electrical connector, remove the 4 bolts securing the fan assembly to the radiator and remove. I chickened out in this instance and got my local VW dealer to do this. Total charge, £230 all inc.
 
4 new tyres, 136,700 miles, 6th June 2012
The Goodyear Excellence tyres I bought exactly 3 years to the day which had covered just shy of 30,000 miles) had done ok. However, I think I could have got more life out of them if I had spotted the excessive wear on the inside edges earlier. Tyre wear across the rest of the tyre had got down to about 2mm and so they were due for changing. A slow puncture on one tyre made the decision for me.

In my continued quest to find quiet tyres, after a little research I decided to go for a set of Nokian V tyres. These are apparently a mid-range tyre from an up and coming manufacturer which had received good reviews and were particularly noted for being quiet. I bought them via mytyres.co.uk and they were fitted by a local garage for £262 all inc. They explained to me that the slow puncture may have been caused by a break in the seal between the tyre bead and the inside of the alloy rim. This could have been caused by corrosion or by the rim not being cleaned by a previous fitter. Anyway, they didn't find any corrosion on the rims but gave them a good clean before applying sealant and fitting the new tyres.

I have to say they are noticeably quieter. I still get the general noise coming up through the suspension which I think is a characteristic of the Mk 5 Golf but road roar is reduced. This shouldn't be too much of a surprise. The tyre tread comprises mainly of 4 concentric grooves with the only cross tread being at the sides. I have to admit, I am now slightly worried how well they will perform in the snow!
 
Wheel Alignment, 125,000 miles, 18th March 2011
An uncharacteristic large amount of wear was spotted on the inside edge of all four tyres. The car's wheel alignment was checked and found to be out. This was corrected and so hopefully there will not be any further wear.
 
Oil Consumption, on-going
This is my first car where I have had to top up the engine oil level in-between services and it came as a bit of a shock initially. However, I have since learnt that oil consumption is quite common for new diesel engines. (VW say oil usage "is to be expected and can be as much as a litre per 1000 kms!") Also, as this car is going approximately 18,000 miles between services it is perhaps understandable that some topping-up is required.

Initially, when I was driving approximately 30,000 miles/year during mainly motorway cruises I achieved around 8,000 miles/litre. Since 77,000 miles I have only been driving on average 10,000 miles/year and a lesser proportion on long distance motorway cruises. Oil consumption has increased to around 5,000 miles/litre.
 
Timing Belt & Tensioning Roller Replacement, 124,800 miles, 8th March 2011
My car's handbook says that, under normal usage conditions, the timing belt should be replaced every 80,000 miles. I had heard a lot of people saying it was very risky to expect the belt to last this long because of the enormous damage that would be caused by the belt breaking. Also, it was a popular opinion that the timing belt should be replaced every 4 or 5 years or so as an added precaution. Since there was no mention of an age limit on the timing belt in my car's handbook I decided to write a letter to VW UK for clarification. Their reply was that the replacement interval for the timing belt in my car had been changed in September 2005 to 80,000 miles or every 4 years. This was apparently because the timing belt is made of a rubber based compound that deteriorates over time, regardless of the distance covered. This seemed sensible enough to me and since the timing belt had last been replaced in March 2007 I decided to get it replaced.

After checking with a few local VW dealers it turned out there was a national promotional price on timing belt replacements of £316 all inclusive. My local dealer, unprompted, agreed to do it for £299 including the cost of a courtesy car. I couldn't argue with that!
 
Air Conditioning Service, 117,250 miles, 23rd June 2010
During a period of very warm weather, I thought that the cold air coming from the car's air conditioning system was not as icy cold as I thought it used to be. Since the car had never had a dedicated air conditioning service or re-gas, I booked it in. It cost £65 from my local VW dealer.

To be honest I didn't feel as big a difference afterwards as I thought I would. Perhaps it takes a while to feel the full benefit of the service or maybe I was imagining the air conditioning being more fierce in the past than it really was. Either way, the air con was certainly working and it was particularly hot weather!
 
Puncture, 113,000 miles, 6th February 2010
My third puncture in this car. My first puncture on the current set of tyres (purchased last June). The front driver's side tyre picked up a 3/4 inch long bolt head screw right in the middle of the tread. It didn't deflate but I began hearing this loud ticking noise as the bolt's head kept hitting the road as the wheel turned. Fortunately I was in York and was able to get the puncture repaired the same day. Cost £20 for repair and balancing. The garage had to use a socket set to remove the bolt!
 
2 new rear coil springs, 107,268 miles, 11th June 2009
MY CAR FAILED IT'S MOT!!!! I thought they were joking when they told me. I intentionally take my car to a local vehicle testing station (which do not do any repairs themselves) so I can be sure they are not just going to invent problems. But it failed because apparently the two rear coil springs had both broken.

Anyway, after contemplating buying and fitting new springs myself, I decided to let a local independent garage do it. It cost £140. Afterwards, they showed me the springs and sure enough, they were both missing about an inch long bit at the end. The mechanic told me they replaced a lot of springs on all makes of car and they believed this was due to the many speed bumps you see nowadays!
 
4 new tyres, 107,122 miles, 6th June 2009
The Michelin Pilot Primacy tyres I bought back in April 2006 were approaching the end of their life (they had covered over 52,000 miles!) and I decided to replace them before my car's MOT due at the end of the month. Because I do not drive so many miles any more, I was prepared to sacrifice a little durability for lower road noise so after a little research I decided on four new Goodyear Excellence tyres. I bought them from Blackcircles.com for £243 all inc and they were fitted by Nationwide Auto Centres here in York. Six weeks later and I have no complaints what so ever. They are a little quieter but not much.
 
Stone in brakes, 31,110 miles, 18th June 2005 & 103,454 miles, 13th February 2009
Suddenly one morning I started hearing this horrible grinding noise when pulling away. It was a bit like the sound you hear when you use your brakes for the first time after the car has not been used for a few days and a little rust has formed on the brake discs. At first this is what I thought it must be but it continued long into the journey when any rust would have long since been cleared. I was really worried either my brakes were about to disintegrate or a wheel fall off so I booked the car into the VW dealer for investigation. It turned out to be a stone in the ABS system. £41 for one of the brakes to be disassembled in order to remove the stone.

Update: 103,454 miles, 13th February 2009
This happened again. The noise suddenly appeared as I took a slight left hand bend after running off-line on an exit slip road. A small stone was probably thrown up and must have found it's away behind a front wheel and into the brake assembly.

This time I took the front wheels off myself and looked for the stone. I couldn't find anything but gave everything a good clean behind here. The noise never returned!
 
Intercooler Hose Replacement, 91,500 miles, 22nd November 2007
This was discovered during my car's fifth service. The garage informed me that the intercooler hose was badly squashed (Probably caused by my first accident). They said this would result in a reduction in engine power and also that there was a leakage of oil from it. I had not noticed any reduction in power but I had noticed recently that I had to top-up the oil more frequently than usual. Therefore I let them replace it. Added another £100 to the cost of the service.
 
Timing Belt Replacement, 79,000 miles, 20th March 2007
Emailed a few local VW dealers for their lowest quotes and my local York dealer offered me the best price with £250 all inclusive, including the insurance for the courtesy car. Had to be done on a weekday however as its too big a job to fit into a Saturday morning.
 
Key fob battery replacement, 2nd December 2006
Simple story. One cold day I went to unlock the car with the remote and nothing happened. Had to use the old key-in-the-door method. As the same keyfob had been used pretty much continuously for 2 years 5 months I figured it's battery probably needed replacing. Fortunately I found just the info I needed on the web. Excellent page with step by step instructions and photos.
 
New Lighting ECU, 59,200 miles, 22nd May 2006
A few weeks before I began noticing that the exterior light switch illumination was behaving strangely. Normally, when it is in the Auto position and the exterior lights are off, just the Auto symbol of the switch would illuminate green (to indicate that the Auto Lights system was turned on). If the exterior lights were on, the green illumation would be replaced by all positions on the light switch being illuminated red (the standard dash illumination colour). What I noticed was that after approximately 10 seconds of the exterior lights coming on, the light switch would return to just illuminating the Auto position as if the exterior lights weren't on! The switch to the left of the light switch; the headlight level adjustment and the dashboard illumination control would also loose all night-time illumination. Anyway, I left my car with my local VW dealer and they ended up having to replace the Lighting ECU in order to fix this. Everything's worked fine since.

Addition: 31st December 2006
The new Lighting ECU however did not have the same settings for the Leaving Home/Coming Home delay. I ended up buying a VAG-COM interface from Ross Tech to enable me to make this and other changes.
 
Indicator repeater in nearside mirror, 55,000 miles, 8th April 2006
The day before my Mk V Golf was due to have it's third service I noticed the nearside indicator repeater housed in the passenger's door mirror wasn't working. I knew that the repeater was one or more LEDs rather than a normal bulb and so it wouldn't be simply a matter as replacing a bulb. Strangly, a little while after noticing this problem the indicator began working again and was still working the next day when I took the car in for its service. I mentioned it to them and sure enough, when I went to pick up my car I was told that the LED indicator assembly needed replacing. Maybe an intermittent fault code had been recorded by the car's on-board diagnostics. Anyway the assembly was replaced a week later under warranty.
 
First Accident, 53,900 miles, 12th March 2006
The Mk V Golf is a very safe car. The Electronic Stabalization Programme (ESP) does a lot to keep you on the road and heading in the direction of your choosing. However, it cannot do miracles and trying to turn whilst travelling a little too fast, downhill, on a snow covered road was asking a bit too much. The result, an impact at about 5-10mph into a partially submerged boulder causing damage to the lower front bumper and radiator/cooling system.
 
Windscreen Replacement, 52,000 miles, 18th February 2006
Pilkington Replacement Windscreen
New windscreen's markings
A stone hit to the bottom right/driver's side of the windscreen resulted in a 4 inch crack starting to appear. I arranged for AutoGlass in York to replace the windscreen under my insurance. I took my car to their premises and they did a good job.

Addition: 13th March 2006

Auto Lights/Auto Wipers sensor
After having the windscreen replaced, the auto lights and wipers do not seem to be as sensitive as before. Also, the sensor looked different when viewed from the outside. I took the car back to AutoGlass and they detached the sensor, cleaned the windscreen and re-attached the sensor adding some silicon gel between the windscreen and sensor in an attempt to prevent any air bubbles affecting it. This seemed to help a little but I don't think the sensor is as sensitive as before.
Addition: 31st December 2006
I eventually purchased a VAG-COM interface from Ross Tech to enable me to change the sensitivity of the Auto Wipers/Lights sensor and now everything is back to normal.
 
Inlet Manifold Flap replaced, 50,033 miles, 28th January 2006
The emissions warning light suddenly came on (didn't flash) after a short period of heavy acceleration in 2nd gear to 40mph at 48,902 miles. There didn't appear to be any change in performance. Fortunately I was only a couple of miles away from home. Once there I stopped the engine and restarted it but the warning light still remained. I checked the manual and it suggested that the car would still be safe to drive but I should get it checked out by a dealer. The next day I drove about 100 miles with the light still on. Then after being parking up for a couple of hours, the light did not return when I restarted the engine. It never returned. A couple of days later the car was checked out by the dealer and they diagnosed a faulty inlet manifold flap. This was replaced 10 days later in about 30 minutes under warranty.
 
New handbrake cables, 18,809 miles, 29th January 2005
When my car had its first interval service I was given a courtesy car and noticed that its handbrake felt a lot smoother than my own car's. Turned out my car needed two new handbrake cables. This work was carried out under warranty and the handbrake now feels much better.
 
Tandem Pump replaced, 17,902 miles, 15th January 2005
This was replaced under warranty when the car went in for its first interval service. It turned out that Volkswagen were replacing a number of cars Tandem Fuel Pump as a matter of routine following the discovery of a manufacturing defect in one of the bolts holding a cover in place.
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