Your car is a finely tuned machine made up of something like 30,000 parts. That number is quite excessive, but that’s only because it’s the number you get when you count every single screw, nut and bolt. The point, however, is that your car is a complex piece machinery made up of interconnected parts.

The laws of physics dictate that over time these parts have to wear as they stumble towards entropy. Proper maintenance of your car is therefore an essential part of ownership. The question for many, however, is when does this maintenance have to happen?

Among the 20 unique features of Pedal is “Maintenance Reminders” which come through to your dashboard as part of the “Notifications” section. Thanks to this feature, you’ll never have to miss another repair, part replacement or scheduled service again. The benefits of doing so are too many to count, but we’ll do our best here in today’s blog.

Pedal Maintenance Reminders Feature

How Does “Maintenance Reminders” Work?

On your Pedal dashboard, close to the top banner where your car’s picture, registration and location info are displayed, you may notice a bell logo with “Notifications.” If you can see notification pods in this space, then you have important things to attend to with your car. Ignoring them would be a big mistake, as we will explain further below. The maintenance reminders could be one of several types, including:

Service Reminders

Pedal will use your odometer information to tell you when a key milestone is coming up that will mean you need a service on the car. The notification will include the date of being sent, plus a “Book” link to connect with your technical partner and arrange for the servicing to be carried out.

Part Replacement

It could be that there is a key component like your clutch that is in need of replacement. This would appear in your notifications stating clearly which part is in need of replacement and a “Book” button to contact your technical partner to arrange an appointment to have the work done. A component replacement might need doing immediately, so having the convenience of the “Book” link helps move things along quickly.

Special Offers

Pedal will notify you when services at your technical partner’s location are on special offer. There may be a special offer when you get a full service and an oil change at the same time, for example. Pedal® keeps you abreast of those offers, which in turn allows you to keep maintenance costs lower by taking advantage of available offers at the right moments.

Why is “Maintenance Reminders” a Useful Feature?

The usefulness of this feature should be apparent from the very start. Car maintenance is an ongoing project for which the work never truly ends. As long as you are driving the car, it will need maintenance. In truth, even leaving the car idle in a garage doesn’t exempt it from maintenance because you have to run the car to keep components like the battery charged up.

Maintenance Timing

Besides knowing what maintenance needs to be done, it’s also about getting the right time. Most car makers produce a maintenance schedule as part of the owner’s manual, but it’s unlikely that an owner will actually it down and read it. After that they may search the Internet for clues on car maintenance, but be bombarded with different opinions from different armchair mechanics.

Financial Savings

This may feel somewhat counterintuitive at first, spending more money on maintenance in order to…save money? In fact, it’s true. Mechanical problems in your car get exponentially worse the longer you leave them unattended. The same thing happens to the cost of your repairs. Investing a small amount like £50-60 to correct a small problem or keep a component or system in good check will save you money because it prevents the catastrophic failures that result in much bigger bills like £500 to £1000 and more.

Furthermore, Pedal also helps connect you with great-value car maintenance deals from your technical partner. That’s an even bigger saving when you can take advantage of those deals to sort out your car maintenance.

Understand the State of Your Car

The more that we can know about the real physical state of one’s car and its components, the better one can protect if. If, for example, it mentions that a certain component is in need of attention, then you might drive the car very carefully, minding not to aggravate whatever problem it is. You might know that it’s not safe at all to drive your car, so you call a tow truck or mobile mechanic service to help you. You couldn’t make these more informed decisions if you didn’t know what was going on under the bonnet.

Typical Car Maintenance Schedule

You should be able to find a detailed maintenance schedule in your owner’s manual. If, however, you are not really one for reading manuals, and/or if you were buying a used car and thus perhaps are missing the manual, or at least the maintenance schedule, then you need more than ever to know what kind of maintenance to do and when. Here’s a rough guide to car maintenance scheduling. You should consult with Pedal to get more accurate information, but here are some general on-average examples:

Brand-New to 30,000 Miles

There are few small jobs that you’ll need to do from when your car is brand-new and heading towards 30,000 miles on the clock. First of all, the air filter will need be changed once every 15,000 miles or so, perhaps between 20,000 and 30,000 miles if you live in a clean area without too much dust or other contaminants in the air.

It’s likely on some cars that the fuel filter will also need to be changed at 30,000 miles. It can get clogged over time, especially when you’re running the car a lot.

Every 3,000-7,000 Miles

At these intervals, you’ll want to be thinking about getting an oil change, first of all. If the oil in your car is synthetic, then it might last more than 7,000 miles. You’ll also want to have the mechanic check the transmission fluid, coolant, power steering fluid, wipers, tires, and lights. It’s unlikely they will need changing yet (see below), but a check is important to see just in case.

By 60,000 Miles

By 60,000 miles, you are likely to need a service to include all of the following things:

• Battery – it might even be coming to end of its life by 60,000 miles
• Change of brake fluid
• New brake pads
• Possible new brake rotors
• Fresh coolant
• Change of transmission fluid

By 90,000 Miles

At this point, your service will include the following things

• Replacement rubber hoses
• Change of power steering fluid
• New spark plugs
• New timing belt

Skip the Maintenance, Pay the Price – Stay on Top with Pedal

When you miss out key maintenance steps, all you do is put yourself, your passengers and your car at risk. What’s more, you’ll make it more likely that you’ll need an expensive visit to the mechanic further down the line. A well-maintained car runs better, maintains its resale value, and helps you to run the car in a much more cost-effective way.

Get your Pedal OBD-II scanner, plug in, connect and start receiving your car’s timely maintenance reminders. You’ll never need to scribble notes onto a wall- or desk calendar again only to forget about them later on. Use the 21st-century solution; let Pedal® keep you on track.