Service alert at 2000 miles

hi,
got a cx-5 2016.5 in late January 2016 and have driven around 2100 mile so far ( Mostly city driving..). Was surprised to see a service alert pop up on the dash last week. .i am thinking this is for a oil change? isn't this very soon? Time based rather than miles i am guessing? don't think i will have to time to go to the dealership for couple of weeks--is it ok to delay this by a month? or am i risking engine damage.

The service indicator is mileage and month based set by the dealer. Since you are approaching 6 months, it's telling you it's time for an oil change. All of the maintenance indicators can be changed by the owner as well. The only one I don't set or turn off after a dealer visit is the check tire pressure. My wife panicked the first time it went off thinking she had a flat. Also it nags you every time you start the car.

seev.1 said:

hi,
got a cx-5 2016.5 in late January 2016 and have driven around 2100 mile so far ( Mostly city driving..). Was surprised to see a service alert pop up on the dash last week. .i am thinking this is for a oil change? isn't this very soon? Time based rather than miles i am guessing? don't think i will have to time to go to the dealership for couple of weeks--is it ok to delay this by a month? or am i risking engine damage.

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Not to worry! In "Maintenance Monitor" app there're three categories, "Maintenance" or "Scheduled", "Tire Rotation", and "Oil Change". The default for these three normally is 4 months and 5,000 miles from factory. You can go into the Maintenance Monitor app resetting them to get rid of the warning messages displayed in the dash. Since it's been proven that the factory-fill is Mazda moly oil, you can drive at least around 5,000 to 7,500 miles within a year to make your first oil change.

As you drive less, I strongly suggest you do the reset and change the Oil Change setting to "Flexible" to enable your oil life monitor. You use "Schedule 1", "Engine oil flexible maintenance interval" to maximize you oil life to save money and reduce oil waste. The flexible OCI can be up to 10,000 miles or 12 months and the Powertrain Control Module will do the calculation for oil life and display with a "%". You wait until "Oil change due" message displayed in the dash and change your oil. You can wait for up to one year for oil change instead of 6 months with fixed OCI if you drive minimum miles in your case. Using flexible OCI won't void your new car and powertrain warranties as it's approved by Mazda. See page 6-4, 6-5, and 6-21 in Owner's Manual for details.

If you use Mazda dealer to change oil, make sure to ask for Mazda moly oil otherwise they'll use something cheapest they can get such as "Preferred Choice" oil used at my Mazda dealer. You've to pay more ($10), and you may have to find the moly oil from parts instead of service, but Mazda moly oil is required to achieve optimum calcutiln performance when you use engine oil flexible maintenance interval.

Remember to reset your Oil Change in Flexible maintenance interval each time you changed your oil so that it starts the next oil change calculation from 100% for oil life.

No risk of engine damage.

I think it's a good practice to drain the factory fill with new engines. There is always a break-in and a new engine lets loose a lot more metal and debris (silicone, sand) since it's brand new. Getting rid of that and putting in fresh oil is well worth money and peace of mind.

I usually drain the new factory fill at around 1,000 miles on all my new cars.

Lbear said:

I think it's a good practice to drain the factory fill with new engines. There is always a break-in and a new engine lets loose a lot more metal and debris (silicone, sand) since it's brand new. Getting rid of that and putting in fresh oil is well worth money and peace of mind.
I usually drain the new factory fill at around 1,000 miles on all my new cars.

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I used to change the factory-filled oil at 1,000 miles. But with more precision on manufacturing process and special oil (with molybdenum) frequently been used as factory fill, it's the thing of past. In fact, Honda specifically stated in the Owner's Manual under Break-in Period section that "Do not change the oil until the recommended time or mileage interval shown in the maintenance schedule."

We've seen member sending in factory-filled oil drained at 5,017 miles for used oil analysis (UOA), and Black Stone even suggested stretching out another 2,000 miles wouldn't be a problem! It showed high content of molybdenum and factory-fill is probably Mazda oil with moly.

CX5_Pete said:

My sample just got in.
About my location and driving habits:
- I don't really experience temperatures below freezing (typical So Cal weather)
- I always allow my CX-5 to warm up till the RPM settles (I timed it once and it was about 22 seconds)
- About 60/40 Hwy/City. Hardly any short trips. I work in construction and bounce between jobs alot so sometimes the commute is all open highway, sometimes its all highway but with 30 miles of stop and go traffic all the way home.
- Driving style: on a scale of 1-10 (10 being really aggressive) I rate myself a 6.
- Lastly, only 4 tanks since ownership was filled with 91 octane gas, the rest with 87.

My first sample:

So it looks like the factory fill is probably Mazda Oil with Moly. TBN shows that I could have stretched it out a lot longer. So for those with brand new CX-5's, stretching out the OCI to 7.5K miles should be no problem. I am going to shoot for 8K mi OCI and will report back.

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Here is another factory-fill UOA from a SkyActiv engine drained at 5,017 miles which has similar comments from Black Stone:

"Mazda FF 0W20, 5,017 mi oil/car, 2.0L Gas, US #4072667 - 04/18/16 06:19 PM atxmazdahonda

First post. Blackstone report on factory fill 0W20, 2015 Mazda 3i Sport, Auto, 2.0L gas, US. Refilled with Castrol Magnatec 0W20. 5,017 miles on both the oil and the vehicle. Cold sample. Vehicle purchased late November 2015 with 55 miles on it. Think it was manufactured early 2015. Oil changed late March 2016. Decent mix of driving but mostly short trips in city.
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Blackstone comments: "Your first sample from your new Mazda has a lot of metal and silicon in it, but don't worry - these results aren't problematic. The extra metal is from new parts wearing in and silicon is from harmless sealers used to put the engine together. It'll take a few oil changes to wash everything out, so we'll just watch for progress until things look more like universal averages, which show typical wear for this type of engine after 6,800 miles of oil use. The 2.3% fuel is cautionary, but some of it may be from cold sampling, idling, or even city driving. Check back for progress"
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MI/HR on Oil 5,017
MI/HR on Unit 5,017
Sample Date 3/28/16
Make Up Oil Added 0 qts
Aluminum 3
Chromium 1
Iron 39
Copper 44
Lead 0
Tin 1
Molybdenum 608
Nickel 0
Manganese 2
Silver 0
Titanium 0
Potassium 8
Boron 178
Silicon 63
Sodium 9
Calcium 2015
Magnesium 10
Phosphorus 629
Zinc 721
Barium 16

SUS Viscosity @ 210 deg F 48.4 46-57
cSt Viscosity @ 100 deg C 6.78 6.0-9.7
Flashpoint in deg F 340 >385
Fuel % 2.3 <2.0
Antifreeze % 0.0 0.0
Water % 0.0 0.0
Insolubles % 0.3 <0.6
TBN
TAN
ISO Code"

These two UOA's prove that there is no need to change factory fill early, unless you use the same Mazda moly oil probably used in the factor fill. But why do you want wasting money for unnecessary oil change and making more oil waste?

yrwei52 said:

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Blackstone comments: "Your first sample from your new Mazda has a lot of metal and silicon in it, but don't worry - these results aren't problematic. The extra metal is from new parts wearing in and silicon is from harmless sealers used to put the engine together. It'll take a few oil changes to wash everything out, so we'll just watch for progress until things look more like universal averages, which show typical wear for this type of engine after 6,800 miles of oil use. The 2.3% fuel is cautionary, but some of it may be from cold sampling, idling, or even city driving. Check back for progress"
-
These two UOA's prove that there is no need to change factory fill early, unless you use the same Mazda moly oil probably used in the factor fill. But why do you want wasting money for unnecessary oil change and making more oil waste?

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So it is TRUE that there is more metal circulating in newer engines due to wear in as stated by the labs statement.

I used Mazda Moly on the 1,000 mile oil change. I always use the best oil and OEM filter. To me spending the $50 for an oil change is money well spent. People go out to bars every weekend and blast $100 on booze. Others go to restaurants and spend $50 for a meal every weekend. Others spend $5 a day or $150 a month on expensive Starbucks coffee. For me, spending $50 on an oil change for a $30k vehicle is money well spent.

It is unclear to me if the metal readings indicate metal particles, or metals that end up in solution from some chemical conversion, or if there are metal particles but at a size so small it doesn't make any difference (i.e. less than the film thickness of the oil). Nasty big particles should end up in the oil filter I would assume. Metal readings mean wear, but I don't know if the wear byproduct in the oil is harmful. The safe option is to change early and often - but Honda says to keep the factory fill for awhile and those engines never wear out (unlike the transmissions in many models).

Blackstone has the data, but I don't know what the numbers mean. The description says no problem (normal).

Seabright said:

Honda says to keep the factory fill for awhile and those engines never wear out (unlike the transmissions in many models).

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Honda is not Mazda and Mazda is not Honda. The engines are different and so are the requirements and oil types. Just in the same way Chevy says to get rid of the factory fill by 500 miles or face engine damage.

What FACT we can go by is that changing the factory fill sooner will NOT harm the engine. That is a fact. Getting newer oil and a new oil filter will cause no harm in the Mazda engine.

Lbear said:

So it is TRUE that there is more metal circulating in newer engines due to wear in as stated by the labs statement.

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But then you failed to mention that the Blackstone also said "but don't worry - these results aren't problematic." They also said "It'll take a few oil changes to wash everything out" so if you really hate those "extra metal" and "silicon from harmless sealers", then your one-time early oil change is not enough.

Of course you also failed to mention that Blackstone also suggested stretching out another 2,000 miles wouldn't be a problem for CX5_Pete's CX-5 with factory-filled oil which had extra metal and silicon at 5,073 miles.

Blackstone certainly feels those extra metal and silicon in factory fill is not a concern and won't cause any problems. And you can't get rid of them with a single early oil change anyway.

Lbear said:

Honda is not Mazda and Mazda is not Honda. The engines are different and so are the requirements and oil types. Just in the same way Chevy says to get rid of the factory fill by 500 miles or face engine damage.
What FACT we can go by is that changing the factory fill sooner will NOT harm the engine. That is a fact. Getting newer oil and a new oil filter will cause no harm in the Mazda engine.

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Because you're using generalized term in your earlier post that it's a good practice to change factory fill early:

Lbear said:

I think it's a good practice to drain the factory fill with new engines. There is always a break-in and a new engine lets loose a lot more metal and debris (silicone, sand) since it's brand new. Getting rid of that and putting in fresh oil is well worth money and peace of mind.
I usually drain the new factory fill at around 1,000 miles on all my new cars.

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So what happened if you had a new Honda and did the early oil change on factory fill? You actually do more harm than good to your new engine!

And if you really follow the maintenance schedule by Mazda closely, you shouldn't change the oil at 1,000 miles as there's nowhere can be found in any Mazda's documents that Mazda suggests you do first oil change at 1,000 miles. How can you be sure it won't do more harm than good to your new SkyActiv engine? We've already known the factory fill in new SkyActiv engine has high content of molybdenum, but how do we know Mazda may also use some special break-in oil for factory fill like Honda does? Not to mention majority of the CX-5 owners will not use Mazda moly oil. If they change factory fill early, it definitely will do more harm to the new SkyActiv engine as all oils on the market will have very minimum moly content than Mazda's factory fill.

yrwei52 said:

So what happened if you had a new Honda and did the early oil change on factory fill? You actually do more harm than good to your new engine!

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So what happened if you had a new Chevy and did not do the 500 mile early factory oil change? You would actually DO MORE harm by not changing the oil since GM mandates a 500 mile oil change to flush the contaminants and to prevent catastrophic engine failure.

TOUCHE!

yrwei52 said:

And if you really follow the maintenance schedule by Mazda closely, you shouldn't change the oil at 1,000 miles as there's nowhere can be found in any Mazda's documents that Mazda suggests you do first oil change at 1,000 miles. How can you be sure it won't do more harm than good to your new SkyActiv engine? We've already known the factory fill in new SkyActiv engine has high content of molybdenum, but how do we know Mazda may also use some special break-in oil for factory fill like Honda does? Not to mention majority of the CX-5 owners will not use Mazda moly oil. If they change factory fill early, it definitely will do more harm to the new SkyActiv engine as all oils on the market will have very minimum moly content than Mazda's factory fill.

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You are arguing from a negative or absence. That's like saying that nowhere on milk jugs or cartons does it say not to inject milk into your veins using a syringe so it is therefore safe to do. Simply because it doesn't state something doesn't make it true or false.

Why do you keep bringing up stupid Honda? This is a Mazda engine, it's not a Honda engine, nor is it a Chevy engine. Mazda doesn't use a special break-in fluid, that's hogwash. It uses standard Mazda moly oil, that's it.

It's a free choice to keep the factory fill however long you want. I could care less but don't try and prove some type of false point that changing the Mazda oil will do harm to the SkyActiv engine. That's completely absurd and how absolutely no factual basis in reality.