Some friends got a great deal on a 2013 Honda CR-V. It really is the classic "one-owner, low-mileage, old lady only drove it to church on Sunday" vehicle. It's got a mere 26,000 km (c. 16,000 miles) on it after nine years, and I think the new owners have put almost a third of that on in the last few months.
They got the oil changed when they got the vehicle a few months ago, and put 8,000 km (c. 5,000 miles) on that first oil change, so my friend took it in for a 2nd one. The OLM was still at 60%. They figure half of the 8K km was a highway trip this summer, and much of the rest has been easy suburban driving.
So the question is, in future should they go by mileage, or by the OLM?
And all the sub-questions -
- Should they have run it down to, say, 10%?
- Is the Honda OLM of that era considered valid?
- Is the Honda 2.4 known to be easy on oil?
- I think the car specs 0W-20, so any compliant oil would have to be synthetic, right? That is, the OLM's recommendation shouldn't be exceeded just because synthetic oil was used, correct?
I really liked the thread a few months back about oil life being inversely proportional to the amount of fuel the car consumed. As I recall, the algorithm applied to the CR-V (4 litre sump, and using an average of 8 litres of fuel/100 km) would be:
4 litres (sump capacity) x 200 = 800 litres
How long to use 800 litres of fuel?
8 litres/100 km x 10,000 km = 800 litres of fuel used
So, by that rationale, 10,000 km would have depleted the oil (i.e. low TBN, etc.).
However, per the OLM, and assuming the oil was 'wearing out' linearly, they could have gone more like 20,000 km (12,500 miles). [8,000 is to 40% as 20,000 is to 100%.]
Of course the vehicle will use more fuel as the temperature drops here, so that 20,000 km would be valid only for the easy driving they've done over the past few months. But still, the question remains - can they trust the OLM, or should they go by time and mileage?
Thanks!
They got the oil changed when they got the vehicle a few months ago, and put 8,000 km (c. 5,000 miles) on that first oil change, so my friend took it in for a 2nd one. The OLM was still at 60%. They figure half of the 8K km was a highway trip this summer, and much of the rest has been easy suburban driving.
So the question is, in future should they go by mileage, or by the OLM?
And all the sub-questions -
- Should they have run it down to, say, 10%?
- Is the Honda OLM of that era considered valid?
- Is the Honda 2.4 known to be easy on oil?
- I think the car specs 0W-20, so any compliant oil would have to be synthetic, right? That is, the OLM's recommendation shouldn't be exceeded just because synthetic oil was used, correct?
I really liked the thread a few months back about oil life being inversely proportional to the amount of fuel the car consumed. As I recall, the algorithm applied to the CR-V (4 litre sump, and using an average of 8 litres of fuel/100 km) would be:
4 litres (sump capacity) x 200 = 800 litres
How long to use 800 litres of fuel?
8 litres/100 km x 10,000 km = 800 litres of fuel used
So, by that rationale, 10,000 km would have depleted the oil (i.e. low TBN, etc.).
However, per the OLM, and assuming the oil was 'wearing out' linearly, they could have gone more like 20,000 km (12,500 miles). [8,000 is to 40% as 20,000 is to 100%.]
Of course the vehicle will use more fuel as the temperature drops here, so that 20,000 km would be valid only for the easy driving they've done over the past few months. But still, the question remains - can they trust the OLM, or should they go by time and mileage?
Thanks!