G35 15,000 Mile Service

My major project this weekend was to take care of the G35's scheduled 15,000 mile service. Originally, I was going to have it done at the dealer since it's a new car and I wanted things done right. So I set out and got an estimate from the dealer closest to me, Cerritos Infiniti. They quoted me $200 for the service, plus an extra $50 for a full-synthetic oil change. Ouch! So, instead of forking over that much money, I decided to do the tune-up myself. I looked at the service manual to see what the dealer actually does for the 15,000 mile service and this is basically what they do:

• Change oil and filter
• Change in-cabin microfilter
• Change air filter
• Change wiper blades
• Rotate tires
• And a bunch of visual inspections

So basically the dealer is charging me $250 for five action items. Ridiculous. So, during this weekend, I changed the oil and filter (full-synthetic oil change with Mobil 1), swapped out the in-cabin microfilter (thanks to this DIY at G-Owners), inspected the wiper blades (which were still in good shape, therefore didn't need to be changed), had the tires rotated at the local Midas for $10 with a free brake inspection thrown in, and visually checked the fluids, belts, etc. Total cost = $60. Total saved = $190. I'm also doing an oil analysis at Blackstone Laboratories to keep an eye out on engine wear and to help "prove" that the maintenance was done.

The last thing that I needed to change was the air filter. I had read from several G35 boards that it's a pain to change out the stock filter every 15,000 miles. That reason, along with several others, led me to decide to just replace the full stock intake system with a cold air intake from Stillen. That project is the topic of the next post above.