michael818

You can take this as you wish but first off, the manual with the car is A3 specific, not RS3 so I would not take the instructions as gospel. Further, at the A0A open house a few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to speak to the project manager for all RS cars. I asked him specifically about break in and he stated that no break in was necessary on an RS3. I tend to believe that he may be a reputable source of information. That being said, break it in as you see fit - if you're more comfortable driving easily, go for it. If you want to drive it like you stole it, go for that. It's your car. I don't think driving hard will break it but you have to drive to your own comfort level. I would take oil changes to the same level - do what you think is right. The project manager was perfectly comfortable with the recommended interval but I chose to change my oil at 2K mies - just personal preference. The oil was clean and the change probably unnecessary but I did it anyway. Ultimately, a lot of the advice being given is old school advice but the bottom line is following that advice does no harm. So, drive conservatively if you wish and change the oil as much as you want, it's your car.

russbert

Definitely will ALWAYS be a VERY PERSONAL choice as you stated and I tend to break mine in somewhere in between the two extreme approaches and it worked on my 911 very well (great performance and reliability). To me it is always about warming up and cooling off the turbos properly and I find it interesting that Audi *requires* the owners to adhere to the first by limiting RPMs until the engine warms up.

Re: oil changes: I was pleasantly surprised to get an email from the dealership offering me a free 5,000 oil change and then continuing on the regularly scheduled maintenance starting at 10,000. I will definitely take them up on their offer!

epiloggts

Just to play devils advocate here a little...

1. A project manager is generally not a technical resource to a project but someone who manages a set of requirements, budgets, timeline, resources, and risks. I'm an IT PM and when I tell you the technical aspects of a software implementation are going to be "just fine"... well that's not based on much more than whatever some developer told me to keep me off of his back.
2. Audi has a vested interest in telling you what they think will make you happy. The cars need to be reliable up to a point, but they also make a fair amount of money on back-end service. If you investigate VW/Audi oil consumption you'll see a few people who followed the recommended services and have high oil consumption and then the manufacturer says this is normal.

As I plan to keep this car for awhile, spending a little extra(time/money) on some preventative service feels like worth while insurance. I also have done all the work myself, so my only out of pocket was delayed gratification on the break-in, and $70 worth of oil and filters for each oil change.

Again YMMV, I'm certainly on the overly cautious end of the "spectrum".

tigerhonaker

Excellent !!!

arU4ic

At the risk of being told that I'm "old-school" again, you shouldn't change your oil too soon either, I believe that there are special additives in the factory oil that aid in break-in and that you should use that oil for the recommended interval.

But to back-up my old school notions, I trust these guys quite a bit;

New Car Care ? How to Take Care of a New Car

Best Engine Break-In Techniques - How to Break In a Brand New Car

and maybe the question should be, why NOT break-in a new $50 -$70k car gently?

festuc

As far as I know AUDI doesn't use them; just regular oil.

BaltimoreCaesar

I hear what you are saying, (seriously not trying to bust your ***** here, please read my entire post) but what you just said is part of the problem. The two main schools of thought for break-in procedures both have decades worth of hearsay and second/third/forth hand information on the subject, with little to no actual documented test data comparing the two. Someone is going to come into this thread and see what you just posted, and in their head take that as gospel and then start relaying that info as "an Audi tech on a forum told me that they do NOT use conditioners in their oil from the factory.", or something of that nature. All that being said, if I was building a race engine with little concern for longevity of the engine and only interested in max power, I would likely prescribe to the "drive it like I stole it" mindset. This being my daily driver that I plan on keeping over 100k miles, I'll say that until the team of engine design/testing engineers and technicians comes to my door with a hard drive full of all the historic engine data and test results that shows wear on bearings, piston rings, cylinder walls, etc. under various break-in methodologies, then I will be continuing to follow the method that the owners manual recommends, and put my trust in the engineers good judgement (Audi lawyer/accountant input not withstanding).

michael818

No disagreement with you at all. Although I do think the manager for all RS cars may have a bit of credibility and, hopefully, has ongoing dialog with the engineers, I agree with you and see no harm in breaking a car in gently, within reason. I was on another forum where a poster was horrified because he hit the limiter once while in his 1000 mile break in period. I'm not saying that you should ne hitting lunch the moment you leave the dealership but I don't think driving a bit more aggressively than the A3 manual recommends will make much difference in the long run. As to oil, I agree that changing it more often than recommended can't hurt either. It may not be necessary but it does no damage.

arU4ic

Yep - and you left out the turbo, most people do, lots a moving parts there too

Shankar

Curious is anyone else seeing this warning on their RS3 saying the Max engine speed is 5500 rpm. Did go past it once :-)