We have a lot of debate on here about Ecoboost cambelts but it seems it's not just Ford where there is sometimes confusion.

Had the Mrs's SEAT Mii (which is a clone of the VW Up! and Skoda Citigo) in my local garage for its service and MOT yesterday. It's now 7 years old but has only done 11,000 miles. 

So we had a discussion about changing the cambelt which is technically overdue. My garage is a bit of a VW specialist so work to the normal VW recommendations, but unlike main dealers who just do stuff whatever, they assess the actual vehicle and do what they consider necessary in agreement with the owner.

The official VW UK line on this is 5 years irrespective of mileage but I did a bit of research on this a few years back on the Up! and Citigo forums (very few SEAT badged versions about, so no help there). It seems a very confusing situation.

The global VW group recommendation for this engine is 160,000 miles, so more or less life of the vehicle. Skoda UK seem to agree with this but then add the comment that they normally recommend cambelts be changed every 4 years on all models. The VW UK recommendation for the Up! as I say, is 5 years.

Anyway,we decided to get it changed. The engine  is a 1.0 3 pot - fortunately It's a normal cambelt not a wet one!😀

 

I've never understood why VW belt intervals are so short.  4 or 5 years is the norm.  So why do Ford & PSA manage 10 years?

As it happens, mine was changed at 94k and 5 years old.  But it's now technically due again 4 years later...having covered less than 20k since!

3 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

I've never understood why VW belt intervals are so short.  4 or 5 years is the norm.  

Yeah, I've wondered about that. "To make money for the dealers" is a common comment on VW forums. But when I asked about changing the belt on my last Audi at 4 years, the main dealer didn't seem to want to do it - and no-one asked if it had been done when I sold it a year or so later!

It's a tricky one, particularly as the car ages. Spend possibly unnecessary cash or risk your engine becoming toast with not even the remote possibility of a goodwill contribution, and ending up with repairs that outweigh the book value of an otherwise perfectly good car. 

Another odd thing was the 160,000 I mentioned. Several VW/Skoda forum members had copied emails they'd had from Customer Services and some said 160,000 miles and some said 160,000 kilometres which is quite a difference!

I've always thought drivers like my Mrs are much harder on their cars despite (or perhaps because of) low mileage. No, she doesn't drive badly, but her usage is almost all very short journeys with frequent starts and restarts of the engine, which I could see putting more load on the cambelt than driving 50 miles or so in one go. I suppose you could say the same about start/stop systems but let's not bring that one in here!