There’s a very good reason why many of these services may not be found in the owners manual. Chrysler, just like every other car maker on the planet, wants to give the impression their cars are more “maintenance free” by recommending that less be done, or is even needed.
This is why you see idiotic recommendations like leaving spark plugs in place until hxxx freezes over, changing fuel filters “when needed”, transmission fluid changes at 100k miles and more, going way over 100k miles before even inspecting valve lash on solid lifter engines, and whatnot.
Good PR and good for the car maker; not so good for the owner of the car. If the car makers feel so strongly about 100k miles trans fluid changes for example then let them warranty the transmission for 250k miles at a minimum.
Trans fluid should be changed about every 30k miles; no matter the make of vehicle.
The fact the vehicle had no symptoms is not the point. Services like this are PREVENTATIVE maintenance designed to head problems off before they start.
Follow this board for a while and just about every week you will see posts that are the polar opposite.
“Transmission fluid has never been changed in 100k miles and why oh why has my trans gone South already? Will changing the fluid help?”
I agree the amount of money seems high and even more so to me here in OK where the standard of living and costs are generally much lower. However, if you live in a high rent locale (LA, San Francisco, NJ, etc.) the hourly flat rate charges can bump the simple things up pretty quickly.
(Even around here I think a transmission fluid flush at a dealer can run around 200 bucks or more now. A local full serve gas station that has been around for decades recently raised their labor rates from 40 to 65 bucks an hour; a pretty hefty increase in one fell swoop. A simple tire balance, one wheel, went from 8 bucks to 15 in one shot.)
“There’s a very good reason why many of these services may not be found in the owners manual. Chrysler, just like every other car maker on the planet, wants to give the impression their cars are more “maintenance free” by recommending that less be done, or is even needed.”
That doesn’t make any sense to me. Owners’ manuals are hardly marketing tools, and any alleged benefit from hiding trumped up reliability stories 248 pages into a glovebox glossy is immediately overriden when the guys in service suddenly tell you that you need to flush every fluid in the car when you go in for a specific squeak.
(The throttle is the one that really still sticks in my craw. Guy claims he knew it needed to be cleaned because it was “black inside.” So, I’m to believe he just, for no reason, opened up the throttle to check? Give me a break.)
What’s most galling is that this “you need a flush” hucksterism is precisely the same that you get from a Jiffy Lube or anywhere else, where the guys come from the back with some random grimy fluid and claim that its horrible appearance means you need to do their flushes. The reason I bring my cars to the dealers is that, in general, they have provided me better and more honest service than the local shops – even the ones I’ve found on this site.
I’m still wondering whether or not I need to scratch the Chrysler people from that list. The Ford folks have done great work for me at reasonable prices, and have never tried to tack on “flush” services even though that auto has double the mileage. From what some are saying here, I ought to conclude that they’re being negligent in not asking me do these.
Thefluids are filthy but let us not forget about the maintenance schedule which tells us all when to change or flush fluids. It’s the first line of defense for car owners who don’t want to have things done too soon. Congratulations about the brake fluid, I recommend that more owners do that. It’s all in the book. Oh 1995. It was probably all needed but I would only have the transmission fluid changed, not flushed.
Lest we forget the “lifetime” fluids some companies have such as anti-freeze and transmission fluid. I remember reading on here that a BMW had some transmission problems and a fluid change helped fix it. When he inquired about the fluid, they said that when the transmission died, that was the lifetime of the transmission/fluid.
Believe it or not, the part about car makers trying to make their vehicles appear to be more maintenance free is entirely true.
Keep in mind the FACTORY wants to give potential buyers this impression but the DEALER may not agree with or go along with this principle.
The object of the exercise is to sell you the car and let it wheeze through the warranty period; preferably without any major warranty claims. Most make it this far without proper maintenance.
You mention the throttle body as being a particularly onerous issue and there is a possible explanation for that. You state the CEL was on and the EGR was faulty. Removal of the EGR means a look-see inside the exhaust gas passages in the intake manifold, EGR tube, etc.
It can be determined with a good percentage of certainty that the intake needs servicing if those passages are sooted up badly.
As I said, short hop/stop and go driving can contribute to the degree of sooting that occurs.
Removal and cleaning of the intake is not part of an EGR job so this would cost extra of course.
(Think of a wood burning fireplace in a home. A chimney sweep does the same thing with a chimney flue that a tech does with EGR passages/intake manifold.)
I agree there is no such thing as “lifetime fluids”. They all break down and 5 years (time wise) is about the limit on all of them other than Moly CV grease and hypoid oil. The latter is usually good for 100k miles but even that is not a firm rule. A lot depends on the environmental conditions. (driving in deep rain water runoff for example)
I’m not defending the practice of blindly flushing everything that comes through the door but there is a time and place for every procedure and a high cost does not mean that a ripoff occurred.
It would still be interesting to know the locale where this happened and to have those dollar amounts broken down as to labor, parts, taxes, and whatnot along with knowing the shop flat rate hourly labor charge.