I put 5W-30 instead of 5W-20 in the ride by accident, is it going to damage anything

 

no not at all

 

For all but the colder climes, 5W-30 is ok. Is sac meaning sacramento? You should be all right there.

 

This past weekend was COLD in sacramento (hey for us bay area people any day that doesnt get above 50 degrees is cold), but still, 5w30 will give you no problems.

 

The 5W30 is fine for all temps. The 5 signifies cold viscosity, so the cold viscosity is the same for 5W30 as the Honda recommended 5W20. Per insider engineers at a major auto company, they recommend sticking with 5W30 (despite factory recommendations and based on their own engine dyno durability experience with 5W20). The 5W20 has a thinner film thickness at higher oil temperatures when you are likely to be running the engine harder. These engineers have seen numerous oil related failures since switching to 5W20 that they never saw before. The auto company corporate guys forced the change to 5W20 to get a tenth or so mpg improvement in EPA CAFE fuel mileage (not real world difference to you).

 

5W30 will be fine, but switch back to 5W20 next time as recommended in the manual.

 

if you do a search about oil there are numerous posts about oil grade. althought the manufacturer does say use 5w20 there is speculation this is because honda wanted to increase mpg and ulev. a thicker weight oil like 5w30 or 10w30 might actually provide better protection for the internals. this is from others who are more qualified to make these statements have said.

 

5W20 oil is not that bad, you can see here for comments on MC 5W20 oil.

http://theoildrop.server101.com/ubb/...c;f=3;t=002134

 

I've also heard that Honda uses 5W-20 to increase gas milege.

 

I posted a through explanation of this at www.svtperformance.com, and there is a link in the Oil Journals in 3G Garage.

Here is the short version I "blew open" two years ago: It explains in part why Ford went to 5w20 (mileage and emissions) and why they said "no synoil for the 2003 Cobra". It had nothing to do with their public statements; it was entirely to play ball with the EPA's ideas on the subject. 5w20 is adequate, but entirely driven by Ford wanting to get as much CAFE mileage as it can across the line, and to play ball with the "Greens" in the world. Higher CAFE down below allows more sales of those profitable jumbo SUV's.

http://www.epa.gov/otaq/cert/dearmfr/ccd0112.pdf