Early oil sludge-Maybe

qmdv

qmdv

Well-known member
I have a fresh rebuild with about 25 miles on it. I pulled engine and trans to change transmission gears (other story). Since the engine was leaking a bit of oil I thought while it was out I would pull the oil pan and change those gaskets. Now this has a Motor City Flathead oil pump and full flow filter I bought from them when they were still in business. I had Rotella T4 15-40 oil in it

The oil in the pan is really dirty and in the bottom of the pan was what looked like early sludge.

Any ideas
 

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Just a guess but that looks like Moly cam break in lube. Almost impossible to get off fingers in the days before gloves.
 
Hey, these old engines were not built with oil conservation in mind. Unless you rebuilt your engine adhering to really close tolerances, that don't look all that bad.
 
>>>Since the engine was leaking a bit of oil>>>the bottom of the pan was what looked like early sludge>>>


You call that early pan sludge? Now this is early pan sludge.


499950
 

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That looks a lot like water contamination. Actual fresh rebuilds should be clean inside. At our shop we run rebuilds on our test bed to check for any leaks, etc. This prevents having to remove an engine to fix a problem. Anyone looking for a rebuild should get reliable references. We have seen jobs where they just steam cleaned the engine and gave it a fresh paint job.
 
Nothing like cleaning an oil pan from the early 60s, With a combination of non detergent and detergent oils, Usually was an inch thick.
 
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