How do you track/organize your maintenance records?

[JeremyJames]

For those DIY’ers, how do you capture and organize your maintenance? I am pretty old school and record it in a note book, each vehicle has their own dedicated notebook.

I know that I am doing this in an archaic fashion. It would be nice to flip to a digital platform for “search” purposes and detail.

Curious as to what you use to track & organize your maintenance on your vehicles?

Best,

[Tbonem3]

Good God man, don't!

I use Excel, and wow what a mistake to total the "$ spent" column.

[DJAM3]

I made the mistake of keeping all my records on a phone app. Phone crashed and I lost several years of records since I last printed it out and my old excel spreadsheet. Since then I've been too lazy to keep records. I just keep receipts. If you go digital, print hardcopies regularly for backup.

[Casa de Mesa]

+1 for Excel. And I hid the total

I have my maintenance in a primary tab. Then I have each project on its own tab.

[Estoril]

I have every receipt for maintenance and parts, two-hole punched in a manila folder, newest on top. For my track M3, I also keep a Word document that tracks consumable refreshes so I don't need to dive into the receipt folder.

[Nate047]

I don’t track the cost of items because I don’t hate myself THAT much.

I track maintenance and repairs and tire rotations etc using google sheets. Easy to use on your phone or a laptop, google isn’t going anywhere, anytime soon. If they crash we’ve all got bigger problems.

[Lee_Enfield]

I prefer hard copy. Just have a binder with scribbles right now but I have been meaning to draw up a service sheet with a blocks that can be filled out as necessary. Something like "Problem/Service item" then a "Repair/Service done" with a date, KM and a price block. Probably a few rows per page. Less interpreting scribbles in the future and the binder can be thrown in the trunk for the next owner.

[maw1124]

3-ring binder (reverse chronological order) that gets sold with the car. When I’ve bought cars that had this presentation it made quite an impression. Each car has its own, which lets the new owner track from warranty work since new under the VMI, straight through to present day. Press articles, etc., that I keep in digital form goes on a thumb drive.

This car has the slimmest binder, by far.

I’ve noticed people have started to use spreadsheets, etc., to present their cars on auction sites and to new buyers, etc. I’m just too busy / lazy for that and hate admin. The new owner can type all that in if they want.

maw

[mtpktz]

+1 on Excel with a Pivot Table.

When I refresh the table with Grand Total $ ..

[Boost]

3-ring binder for receipts. I'm weary of computers crashing, breaking, etc. I use google sheets to organize everything and tally up the $$

[lemoose]

I was using a spreadsheet on my work laptop which when i changed companies i stupidly forgot to store elsewhere. About 5 years of records including the big 3 so needless to say the cost column was absurd lol

[TexaZ3]

Spreadsheet with each item numbered to a corresponding hard copy in a binder. I have too many cars not to do it.

[Norocehcap]

Google sheets

[K-Dawg]

I have a folder with all the receipts and another with manuals and other paperwork.

Then I have an Excel spreadsheet with where each purchase was made, what was bought, when it was bought, how much it cost, when it was installed (date and mileage). I added it up once. 😲

[nahvkolaj]

I use the Road Trip app on my iPhone. I track gas, insurance/reg, and all maintenance in that one app. It backs up to the cloud and lets me track multiple vehicles.

I also have a spreadsheet with the major stuff I did to the M3 while it was down for the first half of ‘22, but that all was transferred to the Road Trip app. All online order receipts are saved to iCloud. All paper receipts (car sale, airbag recall, alignment, etc.) are in a manila folder somewhere.

Future plans, checklists, and general notes for the M3 are in my Obsidian notes app that syncs via iCloud across my iPhone and Surface for easy reference.