I just got my oil report back from Blackstone labs and they noticed an abnormally high level of copper in my oil sample (36 ppm compared to 1-3 ppm in the previous years' reports). The car drives fine and has always driven smooth, no noises coming from the motor and oil pressure has always been good (25-30 psi warmed up). Do you guys think this could be bad news?? It's been 3 years and about 6000 miles since I did the cam swap on my car, seemingly with no problems, but now it looks like the bearings could be starting to go? Could the copper be from anything else in the motor? I guess the only way to know for sure would be to tear into it?

What would you guys do? Is it safe to still drive the car?

 

While I cannot give you exacting details as to things such as how many PPM is too much, I can tell you that the copper increase is due to wear of some sort of components. It as you already suspected is most likely bearings.Cam bearings being even more specific. How many miles were on the bearings before you did the cam? Did you put new bearings in at the time of the swap?

 

How do you know it's the cam bearings and not main or rod bearings I was just wondering... The car had roughly 50,000 miles on it before doing the cam swap, and no bearings were changed when the job was done.

 

Because the cam bearings are softer metal, hence the copper alloy found in your oil.

 

If its got good oil pressure and does NOT knock. Run it.

 

I agree. I would also not run the car that much. if the motor eats a cam bearing ur going to have to open it up anyway to change the bearings anyway but ur going to risk srewing ur cam. Just my 2cents.