Servicing

Hey all, decided to take the plunge and get my first, always wanted one since they day they were released, 17 years later and here I am waiting for it to be delivered.  I'm blaming the bordem of lock down! It's an NA not Turbo

I have a question on servicing, it's got 28k on the clock and FSH, I'm planning on keeping it factory, maybe upgrade brakes etc. as and when they need doing, but do I still need to pay to get it serviced at a garage to maintain it's FSH?

I've restored plenty of classics so able to maintain myself, would receipts of all the service parts used being filed be enough for a future purchaser to be happy with it (although may be many years away) or do they need to see the stamp in the book?

Cheers and can't wait to get it delivered!

Congrats and welcome along. I bought mine last year with a recent history of servicing with Back on Track and prior to that with well known garages. I have opted to do my own servicing from now on after asking the same question on here previously. I have for my previous cars done the same thing (had a Skyline, 350z, Celica GT4 all which have their own quirks like the VX does) and never had a problem selling the car on. In fact, when doing it myself with my brother/father (both car mechanics with combined 70 years experience on everything from lorries to ferraris) we pick up a lot of stuff your vauxhall dealer doing the work to a time limit without the personal investment in the car might not, we check and fix everything. 

For my previous cars I have kept a history of work with photos and receipts which helps, I also create my own websites for my cars where I keep a record like this http://vx220turbo.mystrikingly.com/ and here is my previous car the Celica GT4 http://celicast205.mystrikingly.com/ 

I guess the question is whether you want to keep it FSH with garages just as a 'thing' as part of what the car is about?

Regarding the brakes, they don't need upgrading. Standard brakes are plenty good enough to stop an NA

Cheers.  I'll service it myself and keep a good history of the work.

Vauxhall dealers will have vehicle technicians that are the same age as your car. Do it yourself if you can. Keep the record file and photo's and watch the value increase. Put it another way, choose any Vauxhall dealership local to you and ask them to prove when they last did a service, let alone anything else, on a VX220.  Then decide if you want them to do anything to your car.

The independent scene for the VX220 I would argue is now the strongest it has ever been with well known owners launching their own businesses, like Max88 and Type 116 and the established players who have been looking after VX220's for 15 years plus.

These cars are the gift that just keeps on giving.

I've serviced most of my cars myself, barring the Porsche because the type that buy Porsche's think it hurts the resale value. But even most recently with the TVR and my old NA I've serviced them at home over a weekend, drew up a detailed checklist with car specific things on it like "toe links replaced?" and stapled it to any invoices for oil/filters/parts. Even signed the service book myself and put down "Owner serviced" with my name and number. More than happy to answer any questions should someone wish to ask in the future. 

I guess its nice to see any more major servicing done by a specialist for example a cambelt or in your case chain service, but if you're confident do it yourself. I think I just took mine to Vocky and took a load of pictures, printed them out and put them with the receipts for the chain/guides. Might have even written up a report as well haha!

Congrats on the purchase! Whereabouts in Hants are you?

The only thing I would say in benefit of having someone else do the service is down to the low mileage your car is. At 28k that's pretty low and means, particularly if you keep it standard, and the miles stay low (which going on average yearly mileages it clearly will), it will always be the kind of car that attracts the higher premiums in the future (maybe even from speculators again, one day!) and having no stamped FSH could affect that. It would certainly be a significant consideration for me. And I'd want to see specialists (like Back On Track in Guildford) stamps rather than Vauxhall!  

Is it definitely FSH now, though? These cars should (by the book anyway, they really don't need it!) be serviced annually, not on mileage..

If you're going to keep it forever, then it doesn't matter - crack on and enjoy!