Overall, how do u find the Maintenance Minder System? do u find it useful or is it more of an annoyance?

do u find it accurate?

as written in the fit maintenance schedule pamphlet, ..."the system is determined by an internal algorithm, which considers the engine starting temperature, driving distance and engine RPM. The onboard computer also judges your driving conditions and habits, and then calculates the remaining engine oil life, displaying it as a percentage."

If one does not drive his/her car a lot or hard, then servicing could be in awhile. i guess u should still go in for an oil change based on time interval right?

 

I test drove a used Mercedes earlier this year with a similiar feature. Coolest idea I had ever seen! Finding the same feature on the FIT was a nice bonus in my opinion. I am not a hard driver and it seems it will be quite a while before I get my oil changed according to the maintenance minder. I only have 1800 miles on the car, however I will probably get my oil changed at 5,000 mile intervals unless the dealer service dept. convinces me otherwise! I am coming from a history of 3500 mile oil changes so it feels weird to me waiting so long. Guess I will adjust though!

 

Personally, I like the MM a lot.
This has been discussed here, and everyone has his or her own opinion, but the owner's manual says not to change the oil early on the first go-round. That's because the break-in oil has extra moly in it, and is designed to help your engine break in correctly.
After the first time, change it as often as you like. I go by the MM, and change it when it shows 15% or less. So far, this has been around 7500- to 8,000-mile intervals in my case. Modern engines, modern oil technology. It isn't necessary to change oil as often on this type of engine as it was on older cars. I am not trying to discourage anyone from changing their oil every day if that's what they want, I just think it's a waste of their money.
Some conspiracy theorists on this forum think it's a ploy by Honda to make your engine wear out so they can sell you another car. Horseshit. If you believed that, why on Earth would you ever have bought a Honda? I trust the Honda engineers' advice, when it comes to maintaining their own products.

 

Good deal Steeldog! Makes sense to me and I will go ahead and let the maintenence minder do it's job. Thanks for sharing your take on this.

 

It sure beats the "check engine" light on GM products. I used the term "hondaglyphics" at first referring to all the messages conveyed through symbols that Honda shows us on the instrument cluster. I was attempting scorn! I was wrong! The car AND the maintenance minder are impeccable. Excellent feature!

 

Maintenance minder rocks! I love it!

 

I Don't like the maint. Minder, and dont use it. Im a car guy and I rarely take the car to the dealer for anything (unless its a warranty problem). The oil life meter is more of a back up for me too, i change my oil at 3-4000k miles depending on where and how i drive regardless of what the meter says.

 

Since my first car was a civic that burned oil, and needed it changed when it turned to sludge at 2500 miles, I have an extremely hard time going by the MM, especially with this climate I'm in. We have so much salt on the roads year-round that it corrodes everywhere, all the time.

I waited until 30% to do the first change, and that was pushing it because it had burned near half a quart already (and I did a proper break-in and had not been pushing the car).

The rule will be change at 4000 miles, and the MM is wiggle room just in case money gets too tight.

 

I use it. I have about 17,400 miles on my Fit and have only changed the oil three times. I check my oil every other week when I fill up, just to double check the MM. The oil hasn't been low or unacceptably dirty.

 

The maintenance minder is cool but you still need to use common sense if MM appears to be giving you flaky information. No technology is foolproof. I keep a paper record of all maintenance.

 

you sir, are wasting your money. it has been proven, and proven again that your oil lasts WAY longer than 3000 miles. that is just a tactic oil companies use to get you to buy more oil. during the life of your car, you will chainge the oil nearly twice as many times as someone that changes their oil according to the maintence minder.

 

My last car was a BMW X3, and the MM on that car said to change oil at 15K miles, or once a year. Loved that, it was a real time and $$ saver. Car before that was a Nissan Murano, with oil changes at 3000 miles. Seemed like every time I turned around I was changing oil..

 

yeah. that is totally unnecessary to change it at 3k. makes me laugh that i used to do that in my mustang.

 

I love the MM and go by it for my oil changes... no reason not to... im getting about 6000miles before it tells me to change...

 

Yeah, Im over it...by the time i have driven 4000 miles its about 4 months anyway. So I change the oil 3-4 times a year rather than 2-3 times a year. Im not hurting a damn thing, and it costs an extra 15 bucks a year for some oil and a filter.

 

Very true! Technology is great, but it's no substitute for a brain.

 

The only way to be sure you're maximising both oil and engine life is to do oil analysis.

Personally I just use the MM. I've always got a bunch of sampling kits kicking aorund - maybe next time I do an oil change I'll send a sample to the lab. But I don't worry about it since the car never uses any oil, plus it comes out nearly as clean as it goes in.

So far I've had oil changes at:
8,586km (8,586km total) / 735 litres of fuel burned
10,350km (18,936km total) / 712 litres of fuel
10,867km (29803km total) / 842 litres of fuel