ok I have a 07 civic which I bought used, It of course has the indicator which says when service etc is due, my main concern is the oil life indicator, I have had the car 8 months changed the oil when it was due, I put 6100 miles on it, is this ok? I had an 02 civic which i bought new and change the oil every 3 to 4 k, I know the experts say you can go longer now, I do mixed driving city and hwy thanks
The recommended oil change interval for my Honda is 7,500 miles, but I usually change it every 5,000. 3-4K is overdoing it IMHO.
You can change the oil at whatever interval you choose, or you can wait until the monitor says it’s time. It’s really up to you.
Much depends on your driving habits. If most of it is highway use and the environmental conditions are not too harsh then I’d say you can get away with 5k miles intervals. If you do a lot of short hop, stop and go driving then go with 3k.
This is also time critical too so in the case of the 3k miles intervals maybe ever 5 or 6 months and even that is a stretch.
In some really severe cases changing oil ever 2k miles may be justified. There’s no set answer as driving habits, environ conditions, and car performance characteristics are different.
The factory experts are frequently wrong and not just on oil change intervals. These same “experts” also claim automatic transmission fluid only needs to be changed every other eternity, valve lash can go forever without beint inspected, and so on and so on.
If you have ever heard about oil sludge problems then be aware that this is caused by irregular oil changes, pure and simple.
This is also a problem with leased cars. Many people lease a car and have no intention of spending their money on a car they’re going to turn in and the next owner winds up with the headache.
Oil life monitors have been around for 30 years. I think you can trust it. My daughter does mostly highway driving and her Cobalt OLM doesn’t get near zero until over 10,000 miles. I tell her to change the oil as soon as possible after it passes 20% remaining.
I always change mine at about 50% oil life. $15 for oil and filter seems like a reasonable expense on a $30K piece of equipment.
ok thanks, I know when it was down to 15% the light came on and I took it in, to be changed, living in a hot climate like houston can be brutal on your oil, I may just do it at 5k, I would like to get at least 200k, on this car my last one had 147k, before it was totaled and ran great
I have run synthetic with 7500 to 8000 mile intervals between changes for over 10 years on all my cars and have never had an engine failure. None of my engines consumes much oil (the worst of the bunch has 187,000 miles and consumes a quart every 3000 miles) and they all look pristine inside when you open them up for service such as checking valve clearance. If you run highway miles and do not have an engine that is infamous for sludge problems then even conventional motor oil can run 7500 miles between changes. All a 5000 of 3000 mile interval does is create an environmental problem (more used oil to dispose of).