Nissan 370Z Forum - View Single Post - Dirty gritty drained oil when I did the oil change today

dlmartin81 · 03-07-2010, 11:05 AM

So yesterday (3/6) was my first time swapping out old RL oil. It was also my first time with an oil containing ester. So as I was draining the oil, I noticed some unusual properties. 1) The oil color was milk chocolate like, mixed with some copper. RL does have a golden-amber color out of the quart. So I guess this is normal. Is it?? 2) The oil was kind of gritty. My engine has roughly 9.3K miles on it...still pretty new. Could the grittiness be because it's still in a break-in phase and those are the metal remains. Or perhaps this is normal. I probably never noticed it with other oils because of the color. Typically, all other oils were pitch black when I swapped them. RL color perhaps makes it more noticeable.

Below are some pics to help explain what I saw. Please tell me this is normal.

03-07-2010, 11:05 AM	#1 (permalink)
dlmartin81 Track Member Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Chalfont, PA Age: 43 Posts: 923 Drives: 09 370Z Rep Power: 608	Dirty gritty drained oil when I did the oil change today So yesterday (3/6) was my first time swapping out old RL oil. It was also my first time with an oil containing ester. So as I was draining the oil, I noticed some unusual properties. 1) The oil color was milk chocolate like, mixed with some copper. RL does have a golden-amber color out of the quart. So I guess this is normal. Is it?? 2) The oil was kind of gritty. My engine has roughly 9.3K miles on it...still pretty new. Could the grittiness be because it's still in a break-in phase and those are the metal remains. Or perhaps this is normal. I probably never noticed it with other oils because of the color. Typically, all other oils were pitch black when I swapped them. RL color perhaps makes it more noticeable. Below are some pics to help explain what I saw. Please tell me this is normal. Last edited by dlmartin81; 03-12-2010 at 09:20 AM.