Here is my oil analysis report for your info. I waited until the maintenance minder hit 15% before my first oil change, at a little over 10k miles / 8 months.

Mileage consists of 95% highway, 5% street.

Honda Fit Sport 2009 - Automatic

Metal levels are high, but the oil lab says that is to be expected in a factory fill. I'll probably have my next oil change sooner then the MM suggests to flush out any remaining engine break in impurities. Comments welcome!

 

aha! its molybdem! Ill have to write this down.

thanks for the post.

 

congrats on actually sticking with what the oil life monitor says.
i dont know how many people have actually done that.

i believe my oil life monitor said 40% when i got my first oil change at 5200 miles.
should i have waited? who knows.

but i have since driven 6800 miles and my oil monitor says 50%.... it almost seems stuck on 50%. ....still havent got my 2nd oil change.

 

I know this has been talked about a TON here, but I'm still nervous about going 10,000 miles before the first oil change. It goes against everything I've learned in the past! I suppose it's not a problem though.

My driving is the exact opposite- 95% city, 5% highway. Maybe this calls for an oil change sooner, I don't know.

Dan

 

Yeah, I badgered the Honda dealer tech about when I should get my first oil change and he kept insisting to follow the maintenance minder so I decided to follow it and see what happens.

I'm also curious to see how Hondas hold up when following the manufacturer's maintenance recommendations.

 

Follow the Minder if you want, but when was the last time you saw an engine wear out from changing the oil too often? I never have, and a change of full synthetic with a filter is only $24. Cheap insurance. I'll change mine more often, and put the MM in the same category as the MPG indicator. Fun to look at, but not accurate.

 

well they tell you to change the oil at 15%.... which certainly gives it a safety margin in terms of "computer error."

also..... does the oil minder simply count revolutions of the engine?
if so, then it's a more simple task (for the computer) then determining ave miles per gallon.

 

No, it also takes into account - Engine Load, Altitude (air density), Air temp, etc.

 

is reallly??????????

 

by 10k, I was on my 3rd oil filter.

Now I know I don't have to change it nearly as soon as I thought.

 

for the hell of it, i called 3 honda service depts. and 2 of the 3 said i should completely trust the oil monitor. one guy was really adamant.... he said, "honda backs the monitor 100%."
the one other service dept said following the monitor is completely fine, but he'd change his oil at 5000 miles anyway.

 

I just came off a '97 Honda Odyssey (1st gen) with a 2.2L 4 cyl.

Honda recommended oil changes every 7,500 miles in 1997 (not 5,000, not 3,000). That's when the maintenance flag would turn yellow, and I'd have the oil changed. If changing the oil more frequently contributed to engine life, don't you think manufacturers would be pushing that (and not their service depts)?

After 225,000 miles it had no engine wear related problems.

Changing oil more frequently is a waste of money. I'd go with the maintenance minder (or 1 year, whichever comes first, as recommended by Honda).

It did have seepage at certain oil seals (distributor o-ring, pan gasket) that started after I changed brands of oil at around 200K. This is just anecdotal, but I think if you're in it for the long term I'd try to stick with the same brand/type oil. I ran Castrol 5w20 but then switched to Quaker State and started getting drips on the garage floor.

 

i now have about 8500- oil life at 30%, im going to wait. i asked the service rep at honda what to do and he said dont go by that all of us guys around here change it at 3000.he then said honda will back it up if any thing happens, i also said i havent rotated my tires yet, he said that ok, when the mm tells you to then do it, honda will back it up if any thing happens to the tires.

 

I will be switching to synthetic at around 5-7k depending on what the oil looks like (@1.5K now)
But thought Id throw this link out there study by Amsoil... No I cant aford it either but I trust the study for the other brands they tested.
Its good to compare say Mobil1 vs. Castrol syn.

I use Mobil 1 religiously as Ive had some higher power cars running the stuff and its never done me wrong

Study

 

The MM looks at average road speed, idle time, ambient temps, oil temp, coolant temp, average throttle opening, average trip time and a variety of other inputs. Does NOT check viscosity in any way, however. My dad had a similar test run at 5k, 10k and 15k (synthetic), all passed with flying colors on his 01 LX civic.

 

The extremely high moly is due to the fact that Honda coats the piston skirts with it. Its not from the factory fill oil itself. This is why it is not good to do the first oil change early. One of the reasons I use Chevron oils because they have a lot of moly as part of the additive package.

 

When's the last time you saw an engine wear out prematurely because someone changed their oil according to the OLM?

 

Honda is THE largest manufacturer of engines in the world! They have way more experience than anyone on this board and they have studied engine related wear to death. Because of this, they produce the most reliable engines money can buy, they know it, and aren't going to risk their reputation on oil changes (something which usually is a money-maker for Dealerships) and has no impact on the sale of a car - how many people ask the question; "how often do I need to change the oil", then base their purchase of a car on it? I'd say 0 (or the limit as X approaches 0)

Think back about where you got your info for changing the oil every 3k (I'm assuming that's what you are referring to). Those teachings have been around since the 50's & 60's because they were passed down to us by our fathers or grandfathers. Engine & Oil Tech has progressed sooo much that a 4cyl is now making what V6 & V8's used to make in terms of power. (naturally aspirated) They are so much more refined and have so many higher tolerences that the wear actually put on oil by the engine is much much less. That combined with the fact that oil technology has improved means that the old adages no longer apply.

I changed mine to Synthetic for two very simple reasons. At $38 every 10k miles, it's worth the extra $10 from my regular oil change, especially when I used to pay $40 every 3K miles in the Altima. I also have a tendency to rev the engine up to just below red-line two-three times per month and I found that Mobil1 in my Integra GS-R made the engine feel/seem smoother and I like that.

As for the Color. Do NOT go by the color of the oil. The color has absolutely NO bearing on the capability of the oil to appropriately lubricate the engine. The only way to accurately determine if the oil has broken down is to do exactly what the OP did, Send an analysis to Blackstone.

As someone else said, changing the oil more often than needed is simply a waste of oil. imagine how many barrels of oil could be saved simply by every honda owner going the 8-11K miles that the MM suggests instead of changing at 3K because it's what Dad used to do on the 69 GT500. Then imagine what it could be like once other companies make it to where honda is in terms of quality... Literally 1/3 of the barrels of oil would be needed that are currently used.

Smart Move OP and thanks for the Report. I'm interested to see what the results are at 20K miles.

~SB

 

I don't believe that they'll back the tires. The tire warranty isn't from Honda, it's from the tire maker. Check the documentation that you got with the car.

 

Kudos to specboy - you hit the nail solid. The FIT is an econocar. It uses less fuel and less oil and less $$$'s because Honda builds great engines. Most likely the primary reason every Freak on the forum bought one - not to mention the fun factor.

Thanks to fufit for taking the time/expense of the oil analysis. Numbers don't lie - that report should be stickied just so ALL who come on board can easily see typical real world results of what goes on inside that Vtec. Smooth as silk as they used to say...

K_C_