what do flakes in motor oil mean, ie, from coolant

[ryan roopnarine]

to begin with, no, this isn't about my e34. i could run 5w20 or throw a can of engine flush after each oil change into the e34 and the only negative that would happen is that the idle would get a little lumpier to spite me. and no, its not either of the fords. american car, 90 deg v6 with small sump capacity, possibly sucked a bit of coolant when a component went defective (though i am not certain). i attempted to change oil on vehicle (i couldn't get the oil filter off, thought that is a different story), and found a significant amount of metal flake in the oilpan after draining it, though no large pieces or the like. does this sound like a bearing issue? could this possibly be remnants from the car sucking coolant, that might be remedied with a succession of oil changes to get it out of the system? the owner said that the oil never turned into milkshake, though i suspect that he didn't check the level visually often/ever. he typically drives 5k between oil changes (with a great deal of highway driving), or until the oil change indicator comes on. the last bit probably gives away what kind of car/engine it is....don't know why i'm including it if i'm trying to protect the owners vehicular anonimity. any ideas? thanks in advance.

[ryan roopnarine]

i'm sorry, its 60 degrees, not 90. if it were 90, it probably wouldn't have drank any coolant. if you flip 6 upside down, you get 90.....

[joshua43214]

are the flakes magnetic? I have seen oil pumps fail and chew up aluminum housings before.

[ryan roopnarine]

i neglected to check the flakes with a magnet, as we needed to make dinner reservations. my suspicion was that it was bearings because they were orange/silver in color like when bearings get scratched up from a degradation in the oil film. i'm not sure if they were ferrous.

[632 Regal]

sounds typical of bearing material, coolant in the oil is about the worst thing you can throw at a bearing. It might not even knock right now but pretty good chance it will shortly. Might want to suggest pulling the pan and do a bearing switcheroo but inspect the crank first if it's galled. If they just run on than it could spin the mains (if it hasnt already) and ruin the crank and rod journels turning into an expensive nightmare.

[ryan roopnarine]

sounds typical of bearing material, coolant in the oil is about the worst thing you can throw at a bearing. It might not even knock right now but pretty good chance it will shortly. Might want to suggest pulling the pan and do a bearing switcheroo but inspect the crank first if it's galled. If they just run on than it could spin the mains (if it hasnt already) and ruin the crank and rod journels turning into an expensive nightmare.


so, if i understand you correctly, the fact that the bearings have been exposed to a slow, tiny amount of coolant for possibly extended periods of time makes them predisposed to spinning at any time in the future? ok then, i guess i gotta ask....is an engine that blew its headgasket and resulted in a milkshake safer from future bearing spin than a motor that had longterm exposure to small amounts? i'm thinking that this person should send some of their oil off for analysis and see how their engine's wear metals in the oil compares to the 500-1000 samples the company has from other people with the same engine. perhaps a transmission sample too.

[632 Regal]

define small amount of coolant? If theres shavings in the oil than it was more than a small amount I'd guess. My experience is in the fact that they only carry about 4 qts of oil and usuall dino oil which could have already been broken down, then add coolant and that equils bad stuff happening. The damage occurs in that situation much more commonly then say a milkshake in a BMW with synthetic oil, that probably wouldnt do much harm in the short term at all.

If the oil was broken down than the chance of a spun main is very high, especially if you saw shavings! I wouldnt even start the thing without dropping the pan and pulling all the main caps for inspection and then if OK pull the rod caps and inspect.

[Ross]

Here,here bearings now or crank later.