On 7 July 2015 I bought my first Honda car (I once had a 1983 Honda CB 900 motorcycle). I bought a 2015 Civic SE 4 door and so far I am very happy to have made the purchase. This is my commuter and miles per gallon were one of my top priorities and low maintenance was a close runner up. I had previously been driving older VW diesels but I was tired of constantly working on them even though they do turn out better MPG's.

I have a few questions that I am hoping the members of this forum could please help me with. Vehicles have a letter number designator, for example, my old 1997 VW Passat was also known as a B4. What is the number/letter designator for a 2015 Civic SE?

I perform almost all of my own maintenance. I found in the owners manual that this engine requires 0W20 oil and it states I can use conventional oil or synthetic. I can only find 0W20 in synthetic and I am planning on using Mobil 1, the one with the green cap for Hondas and Toyotas. My dealer claims I should change the oil every 5000 miles but the book says to follow the computer and change the oil when it says the oil life is down to 10%. Currently I have 3100 miles on the car and the oil life is still at 80%. At this rate I will exceed 5000 miles. I am planning on going 7000 oil change intervals as long as the oil life computer does not tell me to do it sooner. Is this a safe or acceptable practice? What OCI (oil Change Interval) do most of you use? I am driving almost all highway.

My car came with 15" aluminum rims which I like very much. I am considering picking up a set of steel wheels and mounting snow tires on them for the winter. Is this what most of you do or does this car handle well in the snow with decent all season tires?

Thanks is advance!