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Intelligent Oil Life Monitor

85K views 121 replies 68 participants last post by  sailor 
#1 ·
(Please note, I don't want this to become a discussion of when to change the oil, but to keep this thread about the iOLM in the 2012 Focus).

Under the scheduled maintenance section, the manual says the 2012 Focus has an intelligent oil life monitor (iOLM) that measures engine operating characteristics to recommend oil change intervals (similar to GM and on new Hondas). The manual says to see the chapter on Instrument Cluster for directions on how to reset it.

There's no additional information in my manual about the iOLM. I'm not seeing a menu item for it under MyFord. My buddy's 2011 Edge does have a menu item for this on his MyFord.

Furthermore, when I did my vehicle health report today, the report told me my car is due for an oil change in about 19,400 miles, which is exactly 20,000 minus my current mileage, and way outside what the device should be recommending.

I'm left wondering if the iOLM is not enabled on my car, or possibly any of the 2012 Foci. Is anyone getting an oil change estimate on their vehicle health report that coincides with what the owners manual says, which is 7,500 to 10,000 for normal driving?

Or am I missing something here?
 
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#2 ·
I've downloaded the 2nd printing of the Owner's Manual. There you can find information about the Intelligent Oil Life Monitor on page 386.

I also found this in the Scheduled Maintenance section:

As indicated by the message center: do not
exceed one year or 10,000 miles (16,000 km)
Your 19,400 miles to go reading might be off because you have so few miles at this time.
 
#3 ·
I've downloaded the 2nd printing of the Owner's Manual. There you can find information about the Intelligent Oil Life Monitor on page 386.
Yes, that's the same printing as my manual. If you look on the next page, it says "Reset your Intelligent Oil Life MonitorTM after each engine oil and filter change; refer to the Instrument Cluster chapter"

There's no information in *that* chapter.

You may be right about me having so few miles, which is why I posted on here, to see what people with a few thousand miles are getting on their vehicle health report.
 
#4 ·
I downloaded the second edition of the owner's manual. It has this information:
Resetting the oil life monitoring system
1. Turn the ignition key to the on position. Do not start the engine. For vehicles with push-button start, press and hold the START/STOP button for two seconds without pressing the brake pedal. Do not attempt to start the engine.
2. Press both the accelerator and brake pedals at the same time. 3. Keep both pedals fully pressed.
4. After three seconds, the Service: Oil reset in prog. message will be displayed.
5. After 25 seconds, the Service: Oil reset complete message will be displayed.
6. Release both the accelerator and brake pedals.
7. The Service: Oil reset complete message will no longer be displayed.
8. Rotate the key to the off position. For vehicles with push-button start, press the START/STOP button to turn the vehicle off completely.
 
#6 ·
Tiger beat me to the answer. They really have you bouncing around the sections to find what you're looking for.

There probably aren't too many people who've owned the 2012 long enough to get the Message Center display about changing the oil. A few may be over 7500 miles, so hopefully anyone who has seen the message will chime in.
 
#7 ·
Indeed. I know there are a few people with 5k or more on here, so I'd be curious if they used the vehicle health report and see when it'd spec to go in from an oil change.

I'm a bit surprised there's no menu screen to see something along the lines of, "Oil Life: 90%", like on other vehicles.
 
#8 ·
Unless Ford is using some new space age gold plated shit, these types of "intelligent oil monitors" don't actually monitor the oil or its real time state because a sensor to analyze the oil would be prohibitively expensive. They use a computer program to stack together and analyze a lot of related parameters that contribute to oil degradation. It does calculations based on the recorded readings, and then compares that data to stored triggers, and when a certain amount of criteria add up the PCM deduces the oil is probably due for a change and triggers the oil change message.

It's basically the PCM guessing that your oil should be changed based on how the vehicle has been driven, and it's probably pretty accurate, but only accurate if you keep driving the car in the exact same way and everything stays equal. This is why electronic vehicle ranges fluctuate so wildly, and I don't think your car has accumulated enough data yet to give you any kind of accurate prediction about when the oil should be changed. After all, the oil is probably in pristine condition, and if it miraculously stayed in it's current state, it probably would be good for another 19K some miles.

It's kind of a stupid engineering oversight, if that's what's happening with your cars oil change estimation, but I'd bet money that's what's happening. Actually it's a VERY stupid engineering oversight, but that oil change monitor is in the software and can't be a faulty sensor or something throwing it that wildly off. Just bad programming.

Hopefully another new owner can chime in about this, I'd be surprised if your car is unique in this.
 
#10 ·
No doubt. My initial inclination was that it was sloppy programming for an 'edge case', but I'd be curious to see other's results. The only reason I'm slightly suspicious is that the recommended oil change interval was precisely 20,000 miles if you added up the mileage on the odometer with the recommendation, which is exactly double the maximum range the OLM is supposed to list.

You may very well be right that there's not enough data, but I wouldn't think that's the case. 560 miles would be 18% of the way to the lower threshold of the OLM at 3,000 miles.

Incidentally, GM put out a white paper a few years ago about the metrics they use in their OLM. It was an interesting read.
 
#17 ·
I think it's just a matter of avoiding people/kids inadvertently doing a message reset. I know if I were 7 years old again, I would find it totally fascinating to hit every damn button in the car and would probably find a way to do it if it were accessible through a touch screen.

And you KNOW there are people out there who would probably think easily finding it on a touchscreen and hitting the message reset would magically change the engine oil, so manufacturers circumvent those people by making the process look intimidating and technical.

There's no reliable way for the PCM to know the oil is new, it doesn't have an easily measurable or definitive impact on the other criteria they use to predict lifespan.

And sorry to the OP for writing a book up there on how the systems work, I don't try to presume what people know or don't know, but I'm in an auto tech program and it's helpful for me to write this stuff out to get a better grasp on it. And I like to look smart.
 
#19 ·
And you KNOW there are people out there who would probably think easily finding it on a touchscreen and hitting the message reset would magically change the engine oil,
Ha~

I was thinking exactly the same thing!

It does seem like some more intuitive process could be found, though. I'm curious how the sequence of pedal pushes and such accomplishes the reset.
 
#24 ·
Some automakers build the engine with unique oil and oil filters that are intended to be changed earlier than the normal interval for the first change. Check the part number on the OEM installed first oil filter vs. the normal oil filter part number. I don't want to start a debate about whether you should switch to synthetic vs. regular oil on the first change, but it doesn't hurt to do the first change @ 3000 if this is the case, then follow the manual from then on out.
 
#27 ·
Manual says 4.5 quarts......is that with or without the filter. I put a new filter on (filling it before I put it on) and had a total of 4.5 quarts in the engine. (that's 4.5 qts. in the filter and engine) On the dipstick it has two drilled holes in the stick and the oil level was almost in the middle of the two......anyone putting 5 quarts in? I'm guessing the other half quart would put the level at the top hole on the dipstick. Input please...........
 
#30 ·
That may very well be, but the 2012 Focus isn't running a full synthetic oil and also that the manual specifically outlines 10,000 as the longest interval for oil.

My personal car maintenance philosophy is to maintain the car, but not over- or under- maintain. I changed my oil on my last car every 7,500 miles as per the owner's manual and got the car up to 170k before I sold it.

I actually have faith in the iOLM technology, but I'm concerned that there's no way to see the current oil life. Maybe I just don't like surprises, but I'd rather know that I'm down to 30% oil life so I can figure out when to make time to take the car in for service, versus having the 5% "Oil Change Soon" surprise me.
 
#31 ·
It's peace of mind for me to change my oil every 3,000 miles & I do it myself......some
people make their bed everyday.....I don't. To each his own.
 
#32 ·
redav; said:
My question is: If you can measure those things the oil affects, and from those measurements detect that the oil is going bad, why can you not measure those things and detect that the oil is NOT going bad? Or, if the computer keeps a log of the measurements, and there is a steady decay with time, it's pretty easy to detect a jump back to the "new oil" measurements, at which time the computer will conclude the oil was changed & resets
These systems are not complicated. They look at the number of miles driven, how many times the car was started. Just those two parameters would tell whether you do hiway or around town driving. Keep track of how many times the car is started and also got up to full operating temperature. Those three bits would provide enough info to calculate when the oil should be changed.

As far as the reset default it has to be at least what they expect the maximum oil change interval could be. Why the chose 20,000 miles; could be they expect better oil in the future that will allow for longer drain intervals and it would be an easier software update if they didn't have to change that constant. I doubt it was sloppy programing.
 
#34 ·
How tough is the filter/oil plug to access? My bride's Panzer has a bellypan that is an SOB to remove if the car isn't on a lift, so I finally said the hell with it and let the dealer do it.
She had a Pontiac Bonneville years ago with a filter that you could see with the hood up, but you couldn't actually touch it enough to remove it without taking off a wheel.
Anyway, I'd rather do my own changes; any problems getting at things?
Moon
 
#35 ·
There is a fabric like cover on the bottom of the car held on by 8 torx screws. They are relatively easy to take out except the center one in the middle almost directly below the dash on the very bottom of the car. I jacked the car up a little bit to get that one out........and I am leaving it out since it is such a pain the butt to get out. [wrenchin]. All the others are accessible from the front and sides of the car. This is on the bottom of the car for aerodynamics I think since alot of German/European cars have this as well. A little inconvenient but only takes about 3 minutes to get off. Gives the car a very clean look underneath!

The filter is at the front/center of the car. It is in a great spot and hangs completely down.....not sideways or at an angle. Easy to spin off and it isn't touching anything else so oil doesn't run down the side of the block/pan. I like it since it allows you to fill the filter with oil completely before spinning it on allowing for a non "dry start."

The plug is in the center pointing towards the rear of the car. 15mm wrench will get it off.

Both filter and plug are in great spots to allow a clean easy change with little clean up. Ford designed this one right.
 
#36 ·
Titanium, thnx for the comeback and explanation. I'll have a look at it when my car arrives; the older I get, the less patience I have with boolchit jobs, so I may just let the dealer change it. I used to change oil at 1K (!) and 3K miles, and always changed a new car's oil after 1K. I just won't do that anymore, and it really isn't necessary. My long suffering TJ Jeep gets changed once a year these days since the old girl doesn't see a lot of miles (at 17 mpg....).

As far as the speculation about the oil change monitor, my current Fit has such thing, and I'm sure it is a computer-generated WAG using number of starts/run time and whatever other input all the little 0s and 1s can generate. It is helpful, since you don't have to keep track. My kid's Caliber has two trip odometers, and she zeros the one when I change her oil; when it hits 7K she says '....Daaaaaad...". Of course, being old school, I put a label under the hood too....
Moon
 
#39 ·
Took mine to the dealer today for regular maintenance at 4,500 miles (slightly early) and they had no clue about any oil monitor. They actually asked me if it had one. They had two guys tinkering around the menus trying to figure it out & concluded that my car had no oil monitoring system - neither one you could look up in the menu comp or one they could operate with their equipment. They said if a lights comes on to bring it back. [confused] Between that & the crabby cashier I wasn't impressed.
 
#44 ·
^ that video isn't for a 2012 Focus. We don't have a menu option in the computer to do that. If I understand correctly, we can reset it manually using the directions tigertiger posted earlier in this thread.
Directions which you'll find in the Owner's Manual at page 342.

P.S. In my youth I learnt (the hard way) that when you are stuck on a issue, you should look in the manual that comes with the f...g appliance ! [?|]
[;)]
 
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