Perhaps I was spoiled owning a VW TDI for 15 years, while I changed the oil and filter every 10,000 miles (Rotella T 20w-40)...all the way to 240,000 miles!
My 2016 Fit LX had been reporting 15% oil life for a month now, and just yesterday switched to 10%. The car is used locally with only about 17,500 miles since December 2015 and about 6200 miles between the first two oil changes.
Now that 'oil change' warning is down to about 5,000 miles. Should I be nervous?

 

 

Honda's service minder system calculates oil change intervals based on total number of engine revolutions (in a nutshell)
So by that logic, if you were to do nothing but idle your car all the time you would still have to change your oil eventually even though you traveled zero miles.
And conversely, raking up highway miles at low rpm will yield very high distances between each oil change.

 

Regardless of what the Honda system says I believe that you should still change your oil once per year. That's especially true if you change your own oil since the cost comes down to the cost of oil and a filter which isn't much. It also doesn't hurt to get underneath your car and with the shield off to take a look around for any obvious problems especially fluid leaks from other engine components. The shield tends to collect drips so that you may not see them on your garage floor for quite a while.

 

I usually wait till I'm around 5% to change my oil/filter. I do 80+ miles a day on my commute and my OCI is about 10k. I've only done it "early" at 15% once when I had a long road trip planned and I wasn't sure how much miles before I hit 5%.

With low mileage driving, it's suggested in the manual to do an oil change once a year regardless of miles driven. Probably not a bad recommendation and honestly oil/filters are cheap.

 

Mine comes on consistently in the ballpark of 4.5k miles. I do lots of city w/ some highway. So I do the oil every 2nd time 15% pops up and and filter every 3rd.

 

alright for a second i thought this was an ebay 15% off notice thread. lol

my wife sends me a text at 15% and just to get it off da table, i do it as soon as i can cause i could be traveling for work and may not get to it for a while. i change the filter each time on my GK.

 

 

I've been at 10% for about a month now. I'd been waiting to get down to 5% but it's almost roadtrip time so I'm changing it today. Once I hit 5% and then it went quickly to zero before I had a chance to get the oil changed; in fact it was something like -22 when I finally got it done.

 

I do read the manual, but have not changed oil myself these past few years, although I'd be glad to do that job. At my age, if I laid down under the car you might all have to come to the ceremony!
When looking to replace my '01 TDI I picked the Fit, for reliability and utility. It deserves oil changes whenever needed; its been a good kid.

 

OK, now its over a month since the warning went to 15%, and now it has been at 10% for two weeks. Not wanting to waste oil or time, I can change oil promptly at 5%: there are many shops and dealers a few minutes away!
But the warning light is a nag: the display reverts to that screen constantly.
Can I reset the warning to terrorize me at 5%, and not before that?

 

Don't think so, get yer oil changed

 

After owning a ford and a mitsubishi, both died due to poor cooling/oil circulation systems, i am hesitant to let my car's oil run for more than 5k miles or 50% calculated life.

 

Before my trip to Bend, Oregon from SF Bay Area, I had my BubbleBee's oil changed. When I arrived Bend, the oil life was at 100% which was about 500 miles. After I returned home with 2,000 miles later, the oil life was 90%.
My daily drive made the oil life to lose quick

 

What does that % mean? I drive 100 miles each day back and forth to and from work.

 

I just use the warning light...as the warning.
By that I mean, I feel I can change it, ANY time it starts to illuminate.
15% I look at as just being an optional "cushion". I don't sweat it once it illuminates, I may wait until I have a convenient weekend to take it in for service. If I get really busy, I might just watch it go from 15% to 10%. I don't think I've ever let either of my Fits get to 0. But if I was chronologically less than a year from the last change? I wouldn't sweat it if I did, or did not.

My baseline is at LEAST 1 a year. Which is happening easily with the maintenance minder with me. More like 2-3 times a year. And my operational approach is, once the minder illuminates, having the oil changed is fair game. It's not imperative I be pulling into the dealership at 15%, but neither do I have to wait until it perfectly reaches 10%, 5% or zero.

In short? If you want to change it now? Change it now. As long as you aren't passing over a year since your last change? If you want to push it a little longer? Go ahead.

 

Honda's oil change thing is just there to get you to bring it in for a service. It's a joke. I send my oil into Blackstone Labs and after about 12k on the car I was told I had about another 5k on the oil life. Next time I put 15k on the oil and was told the oil had about another 3k life left before needing changed. My car told me to change the oil at about 9k. lol It's better to know than it is to guess about things like the lifeblood of your motor.

oil: Mobile 1 0-20
Filter: PL14610

 

I used to change oil on my '01 TDI every 10,000 miles using Rotella T 5w-40 for the 240,000 miles I had it...and it is still going strong under another owner. A diesel tends to be dirtier, with much more forceful combustion pressure.

 

Thanks for posting this, it's good to know the meter seems to be on the conservative side, better than the alternative. Last night I was talking to a friend who just bought a new 2018 RAV4 and we got into a discussion about oil changes. From what he says the RAV4 has the 'dumb' reminder that automatically goes off at 5K increments (just like our '08 Scion and '12 Corolla -- still the same tech, no update). He has the old school 'change at 3K' mentality and I told him with the 'new' synthetic even the 5K recommendation is probably a bit on the conservative side. I went on to explain how the Fit's dynamic system works and how I just followed the meter and didn't keep track of the mileage. But I got some respect when I mentioned I just changed the Fit's oil a few weeks ago at 5% on the meter and the dealer told me I had gone a year and 11K+ since my last change.

 

Thanks for sharing that!
Here's what my maintenance manual states:
'Oil Life Display.
The engine oil life indicator starts to appear along with other due soon maintenance item codes
when the remaining oil life becomes 15 percent. The engine oil is approaching the end of its service life.
....Maintenance Minder Indicator Starts to come on when the remaining engine oil life becomes 15 percent.
It goes off when the display is switched.'
But on my '16 Fit the wrench stays on constantly after the 15% warning....and does NOT go off.
I understand that the dealer wants more $$$, but I also do not want to waste good oil.