2009 Volkswagen Jetta TDI: Belated 10,000 mile birthday

Well if you need to do the oil change yourself instead of using the dealer, you could always mail order it:
http://www.tdiparts.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=28_127&products_id=496

I'm pretty sure you are correct, blankfocus. I suspected as much and attempted to confirm the existence of free maintenance by reading the manual. And then I found that our car has the wrong manual in it.

Most diesel engines use a 15W-40 oil weight. 5W-30 is somewhat unusual for a diesel.

I don't know if "most diesel engines" applies in this new era of low-sulfur, clean diesel engines, massive particulate filters and occasionally (but not here), urea additives. The VW 504-compliant oils listed all happen to be 5W30.

http://www.vw.com/myvw/carefree/en/us/
"Every 2009 Volkswagen comes with Carefree Maintenance, including a no charge Courtesy Vehicle Check. Add in regularly scheduled maintenance for three years or 36,000 miles, at no charge,* and you're liable to experience an Anti-Anxiety Attack: an overwhelming feeling that everything is perfectly under control. Peace of mind. It's what the people want. "

Maintenance is completely free for 3 years/36,000 miles.
Now that VW's high initial MSRP price seems a little better compensated...

To reset the service now indicator, follow the instructions a few posts deep in the thread here:

http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?&id=2457779

Also, with a 2009 TDI engine, you want VW 507.00 oil, no? ... probably best to buy online-- the TDI enthusiasts over at tdiclub.com have found issues getting this oil from some dealers (who tend to stock 505.01 oil used in earlier TDIs... so the 'free' service may be free service with the wrong spec oil)

Edit... I see now that the oil spec doc lists 504.00 and 507.00 in the same category-- ignore that part. (would be great to edit my previous post).

I don't believe he got the correct oil. Only the gold bottled Castrol oil labeled 507 is acceptable for the '09 TDI. At least that is what my manual reads.

I like the 50mpg on the display. I have a question. The test drive I did had a lot of turns and a few stops so the calculated MPG was going all over the place. Does the projected MPG "smooth out" once on the highway?

For sure, the MPG smooths out very quickly. Just make sure the display is on average MPG instead of instant - designated by a '1' or '2' on the display (trip 1 or trip 2).

The display in the photo above must be an "instant" MPG since there is neither a '1' or '2'and the numbers quoted by Dan would indicate an average of 35MPG. Come to think of it, how did they get that 50 there unless they were driving AND taking a photo. Shame on you guys!

I just passed 3500 miles on my new Jetta TDI. Best MPG so far is 42.3MPG (with snow tires in Vermont) and worst was 34.0. I absolutely love this car - fun to drive, good handling, comfortable seats and lots of storage - including a center armrest pass through for skis.

I hope to pick one up in a week or two. I can't wait.

If your going to buy one for fuel economy, get a stick shift. The mpg is substantially better. But the auto is good too.

While maintenance is "free" for 36k miles look out for the 40k service if you have a DSG car. Am hearing costs of $400-600 for the *transmission service only* at 40k miles.

If you do the math and include increased maintenance costs over 100k miles (flush trans. twice, timing belt) you find much of the diesel cost savings evaporate due to high maintenance requirements. You do get MUCH better resale, though!

Maybe someday VW will make a car with reasonable maintenance costs. Over 5 years my B5 Passat has been 20% more expensive than my 210 chassis MB!

As vwthing1 stated...the CORRECT OIL FOR THE '09 is 507.00 The owners manual goes into great detail about this oil and warns against use of any other oil. It can be hard to find at some dealers. But Mobil1 also makes a 5W30 ESP Oil that is 507 rated as well!

superm...the DSG service should not be more than $200 and the new timing belts are rated to 120k miles now!

Technically, you're right to four decimal places, but I'm right, too. Our 2009 Jetta had the wrong owner's manual in it (2008 Jetta), so I had to look up the TDI online.

I found the 504 reference on a TDI forum, then I kept searching and found an actual VW Technical Bulletin--the link in the original blog post. Look at it. You'll see that the list of factory-approved VW507 and VW504 oils are the exact same oils. In fact, the VW bulletin treats them as one, referring to them as "VW504 00/507 00".

It makes no difference because there really is no difference. Any bottle of the right stuff will have both numbers on it.

A question to VW: does it really have to be this difficult to find and buy the right oil?

I think they took that mileage picture from the instant mileage while driving as a previous post stated (tsk! tsk!). The screen will show a small 2 when it is your longer term mileage that you can reset yourself (I use that for each tank) or it will show a 1 for the individual trip that the computer resets itself after a few hours of being turned off.

For anybody looking into buying one of these, I'm taking my in for the 10,000 mi service next week and I love it as much as the day I bought it. I avg 39 to 43 mpg on the way to work each day in mixed driving depending upon how I hit the lights. My best trip was across town, mostly freeway with few stop lights ..... 51 mpg! I never get below 31 mpg for any trip longer than about a mile.

One note on long trips: I've driven between LA and Phoenix a few times and if you drive 80 mpg you avg about 38 mpg, but if you keep it down to 65-70 mph (which I haven't done), you would likely get in the upper 40s toward 50 mpg.

I would expect better mileage from the TDI. The '06 Chevy HHR 2LT 2.4 auto I had achieved a tad better than 35 MPG on a road trip once that consisted of mountains, some stop & go, avg 5 MPH over the limit, cruise as much as possible and 30 (ish) minutes of panic full-throttle when I realized I made a wrong turn and was lost. Total 512 miles and 14.6 gallons to refill (at the same station). That trip was from Bellwood, PA to Niagra Falls, Canada and back (google map it). The DIC was only a few tenths different than what was calculated by my calculator. I was very impressed and miss that mileage now. I know if I would've taken a long steady trip south, maybe to Florida, I could've easily gotten 37-40 MPG. Makes me want to consider a new Malibu with the 2.4 and 6-speed auto tranny. Couldn't be any worse than the HHR with a 4-speed auto.