Post Gearbox Service Driving

G

George.E89

Member
 Kent
Hi, I recently had a gearbox service done on my BMW Z4 35i with 7 speed DCT, some sites when googling about driving after the service suggest I need to drive smooth and gently for 500 miles, whilst others just say to smoothly transition through the gears when first driving and that is it.

What is true, I have driving very smoothly and gently now for 250 miles, do I need to do so for another 250?

For reference everything is working smoothly and as it should, at to clarify when I say gearbox service, this included a change of the oil, and both filters, and new sump pan with gasket, and all the new adaptations reset
 
No…but maybe just don’t do a few burn outs for the next few miles..in fact don’t do burn outs
 
B21 said:
No…but maybe just don’t do a few burn outs for the next few miles..in fact don’t do burn outs
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Thank you for confirming and no I weren’t referring to that extreme of burnouts lol, although this being my first RWD car I did do a few when I first got it lol, I was just wondering about the occasional pulls, I’ve done 250 miles now so I can drive however right?
 
George.E89 said:
Hi, I recently had a gearbox service done on my BMW Z4 35i with 7 speed DCT, some sites when googling about driving after the service suggest I need to drive smooth and gently for 500 miles, whilst others just say to smoothly transition through the gears when first driving and that is it.

What is true, I have driving very smoothly and gently now for 250 miles, do I need to do so for another 250?

For reference everything is working smoothly and as it should, at to clarify when I say gearbox service, this included a change of the oil, and both filters, and new sump pan with gasket, and all the new adaptations reset
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George, out of interest how much did you spend on the gearbox service, and have you noticed a difference?
 
George.E89 said:
Thank you for confirming and no I weren’t referring to that extreme of burnouts lol, although this being my first RWD car I did do a few when I first got it lol, I was just wondering about the occasional pulls, I’ve done 250 miles now so I can drive however right?
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It will be fine ..just don’t share the car with someone who drives like Miss Daisy and you’ll be a ok..
 
James35i said:
George, out of interest how much did you spend on the gearbox service, and have you noticed a difference?
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I bought a service kit, £390, this included 7L of the specific oil you need, internal and external filters and new sump pan, labour cost would be a few £100 usually, but because a friend of a friend did it it was only £100, but expect roughly £600-£800 for it to be done, or less if you do it yourself

In all honesty I don’t notice a huge difference, bar it being a bit smoother, my car was at 87k miles and a 2009 and they recommend you doing the gearbox service between 60-70k miles so it was overdue really, but when it was done apparently the oil that came out was black and there was only 5L of it so it was good I done it, I mainly did it though as I want to do an XHP gearbox flash so I thought it was smart to do that before stressing it further

I have done everything service wise for my car bar walnut blast, which is coming soon, and timing chain but a specialist I spoke with actually said this isn’t necessary as he’s seen some go for up to 200k miles but he did say to have money there for it and at the first sign get it done otherwise don’t worry as it may have loads of life left
 
George.E89 said:
I bought a service kit, £390, this included 7L of the specific oil you need, internal and external filters and new sump pan, labour cost would be a few £100 usually, but because a friend of a friend did it it was only £100, but expect roughly £600-£800 for it to be done, or less if you do it yourself

In all honesty I don’t notice a huge difference, bar it being a bit smoother, my car was at 87k miles and a 2009 and they recommend you doing the gearbox service between 60-70k miles so it was overdue really, but when it was done apparently the oil that came out was black and there was only 5L of it so it was good I done it, I mainly did it though as I want to do an XHP gearbox flash so I thought it was smart to do that before stressing it further

I have done everything service wise for my car bar walnut blast, which is coming soon, and timing chain but a specialist I spoke with actually said this isn’t necessary as he’s seen some go for up to 200k miles but he did say to have money there for it and at the first sign get it done otherwise don’t worry as it may have loads of life left
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Very insightful, thank you! I'll add it to the list of jobs to do in 2026, alongside getting a limited slip diff.
 
George.E89 said:
Does having very different driving styles have a bad effect then?
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There is some simple simple adaptive logic buried in the TCU…so it ‘learns’ people’s driving styles ..then takes a while to re-learn..not sure how effective or not it is…imho
 
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