First owner for a Honda. I now have 811 miles on it. I am not a hotrod, but the fuel seems to go fast. We took a short trip at 50-60 MPH for 374 miles and recorded 47.8 MPG, but my wife filled the tank so maybe the fill wasn't complete. The next 296 miles (city miles) has the fuel gauge needle at almost the 1/4 mark. Next time I will fill the tank.

Does the engine come with a break-in oil? I usually drive a new engine at 50-60 MPH for about 1,000 miles and then change the oil and filter to get the metal wear particles out of the engine. My Honda dealer thinks I am nuts, but our present 1987 Chev Celebrity 2.5L 4 cyl and autotrans. has 251,316 miles, doesn't smoke, and still gets 31-33 MPG at 65 MPH on trips with 10W-30 dino oil with oil/filter changes at 3-4K miles.

Honda recommends 5W-20 oil, but 5W-30 oil has much better specs., and my 10W-30 has even better specs. I assume the 5W-20 Honda recommendation is for the Fed. mileage rating to get that last .001 improvement in MPG. My dealer provides the first oil/filter change, but I am prone to go with 5W-30 on my first change and then go to 10W-30 dino or synthetic (Mobil 1 10W-30) on subsequent changes. What do the forum members recommend from experience?

The owners manual says use Honda fluids for everything (brake, power steering, and autotrans), but all of our U.S. made vehicle manuals recommends that we use Delco, etc. , but I never did due to the extra expense. All of the Honda fluids are made in the U.S. so I question the idea of using only Honda fluids since some U.S. oil company makes the Honda fluids. What is the opinion of forum members and their experience?

Our Chev autotrans has a lockup converter, but I don't detect one on our new Honda. That is too bad since that device is responsible for our excellent MPG on a larger and heavier car.

 

Hello New Member...Welcome to the forums..

WheelBrokerAng[sm=americanasmiley.gif]

 

Your MPG of 47.8 from a US Gallon sounds very good to me indeed, I have achieved 40 mpg (UK larger Gallon), though my car is a 96.

If it was me I would stick to either 5W-20 or as you mentioned 5W-30. not sure why your 10W-30 is a better spec other than being synthetic.
I use a semi-synthetic and 10W-40W because it is cheap and my engine has 100k on it.

The first figure denotes the viscosity the oil can be pumped around the engine cold. Therefore a 5W-20 can be pumped around the engine easier when cold than a 10W-30,
As we know the engine at startup (particularly cold) is where the most friction hence wear occurs. Because of this I would reccomend at 5W-?? oil at least. The latter figure corresponds to the viscosity of a single grade oil at the operating temperature.

I am not sure but this means the 5W-30 oil is a higher viscosity at normal operating temp and will reduce the MPG as the engine has to work againt the thicker oil.

The thicker viscosity may well prevent engine wear at normal temp. I would stick to what Honda recommend as they designed and built the engine. They know what is best IMHO

 

I have a 2006 Accord EX-V6 and am at 3100 miles and wondering when I should do my oil change. There is a gauge that denotes Oil Life and it at 40%. Should I wait till that gets to 5-10% (which is 5000 miles) or change it now? Are accords better changed a 5000?

Also, I have a navigation system and was wondering if there's anyway to play DVDs on it.

 

The statistics for Valvoline syn. 10W-30 is pour point -48C versus -36C for 5W-20 dino. Viscosity at 40C is 65.05 for syn. 10W-30 versus 45.9 for 5W-20 dino. The pour point determines the flow point of the oil at cold temperture with the lower number being better for starting. The higher viscosity at 100C of 10.60 verus 8.36 will reduce fuel mileage only a fraction, but it will give you a thicker film of oil in the bearings. The pressure strength of synthetics is much higher than the above dino's.

I have seen the stats for Mobil 1 and Amsoil and they are better than the Valvoline (as I remember). I believe the Mobil 1 10W-30 pour point is around -58C. That oil is going to flow in a cold engine.

If the manufacturers didn't have to meet the mileage figures then they would not be recommending any 5W- oil. My present car with 251K miles has been on 10W-30 from day 1. The engine doesn't leak or smoke. When the phenolic timing gear dissolved at 189K miles, the bearing clearances were half way between min. and max. so I still have the original bearings.

And my first MPG at 47.8 was probably due to my wife not filling the tank although she put in more fuel after the nozzle shut off.