Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet
I own 3 2014 Hondas, two civics and an accord.
There's a huge thread started by me a while back about Honda and their Oil Life Indicator (OLI) system.
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/3498755/1
Since your new to BITOG (welcome!) I'll sum up the major camps here for you:
1) Do whatever the manufacturer says - trust the OLI systems and only change it when it says to.
2) Don't trust the OLI's completely and just use them as a guide. (I'm in this camp)
3) Don't trust OLI's at all.
Camp 1 seems to want to squeak every last mile they can from the oil before changing it.
Camp 2 wants to strike some balance between camp 1 and 2.
My neighbor is the head mechanic at a Honda dealership. From conversations with him, threads here on BITOG and my own common sense, here's what I'm doing with my new Honda's:
1) Factory fill - drive it to 20% on the OLI
2) From then on running Mobil 1 extended 0W-20 and a Mobil 1 filter and running it to 30% on the OLI.
Oh, one other thing, I use the "dip stick/smell/feel" method also. Regardless of the OLI, if the oil feels like crud or smells of too much fuel I'm changing the oil.
I know this post will get a lot of heat, but to me oil is cheap, engines are not.
Edited: one Civic is at 12K, changed oil at 40%/6.5K and did a UOA. Lot's of life left on the oil. The two other cars are still on factory fill, one is 30% and the other 40%.
sasilverbullet is on the $$$$.
Here is the problem with Hondas, the fuel dilution kills the oil, the OLM will not measure that.
This is my experience, hence I go 5k with full syn, sometimes I do filter every other oil change.