Hello everybody.

I have a question about how the TaurusX knows when it's time to change the oil. The obvious answer is that it has a 3000 mile counter in it, but based on my driving history, something that is happening now is weird to me.

I have a company vehicle with a pre-paid maintenance plan. The plan calls for an oil change every 5000 miles. I currently have 38000 or so miles on the car and haven't missed an oil change. So here's the problem. I just got close to the 38000 mark, and the vehicle is telling me I need an oil change. Makes sense, because my last one was about 34500 or so. However, if it's because of a 3000 mile counter or something, I've never seen the car tell me it's time for an oil change before. There were some times that I forgot to reset the oil life %, so this message is even weirder to me because of that. Does the vehicle have another way of monitoring the oil? Such as an opacity with a light source or something along those lines? I took the dipstick out of the engine and it didn't look overly dark; more like a semi-transparent brown. I'm not a car guy at all, so I honestly don't know if it looked good or not. I'd hate to get an unschedule oil change if I don't need to, but will if necessary.

Thanks!

 

It should remind you of an oil change service every 5k miles and it is reset at each oil change to 100 percent. If you change it earlier then it wont remind you. If you change it late it will hound you. Am I understanding your question?

 

Yeah, you did. I just wanted to make sure there wasn't anything else besides the mileage counter. I could have sworn that I reset it but maybe I didn't, who knows.

Thanks!

 

My '08 "X" is calling for 7,500 mile oil change intervals in the Owner's Manual. It only has 1100 miles on it, so I don't know when the reminder's going to pop up, but your situation sure sounds strange.

BTW - Does your have weird headlights? On mine, the low beam, especially the driver's side, is horrible. If it weren't for the foglights, I doubt I'd be able to see anything at night. Just curious.

 

It would be nice if the headlights were brighter, I agree. Too bad they aren't the halogen types... I sometimes catch myself trying to turn the lights on again while they are already on, thinking they are off, but I think that's more of an impulse from my last car. My Altima had automatic lights (why doesn't a 2008 vehicle of any kind not have automatic lights, Ford?), and I think subconsiously my brain randomly says "you forgot to turn on the lights!" when I really didn't, haha.

 

I'm at 6700 miles and I haven't seen any oil change dummy light and my manual also says 7500 miles for "standard" driving. The driver's headlight is more spread out than the passenger side, but I run the fogs all the time anyhow so I don't notice the difference. As a side note, if you turn the headlight switch to the left, that is the automatic light position. I'm not sure of your model, but mine has it. My 2003 Super Duty has the same thing...are you sure yours doesn't?

 

Nope...no left position past off. It's off, parking lights, then regular lights. I've driven a 2008 edge as a rental and it had it, so not sure why my X doesn't.

 

The auto headlight option just depends on which model you have.

I believe the oil life capacity is set to 7,500 miles. My wife routinely goes 5,000 between changes and the message never appeared. She went to a quick lube place the last time who apparently didnt reset the life so the message appeared about a month later.

 

I think I've decided that I just didn't reset the counter this time, haha. Though I think the cause of my confusion is not knowing that the oil life percentage was based on 7,500 and not something like 3,000. It definitely makes sense if it is 7,500 due to the fact that I get my oil changed every 5,000 and I got the warning about halfway inbetween the next cycle...