I topped off the oil in my drive the other night. When I pulled the drain plug, some of the existing oil ran out. I was suprised just how dark it was. It had a slightly burned smell to it too. This is the standard green merc high performance oil. You know how that stuff can smell. The drive is showered and hasn't given me an ouce of trouble. The magnets had very little metal on them. They were almost clean. There was no metal in the oil. Any thoughts?

merc oil WILL seperate!...ie sludge

how many hours on the oil? I go 25 hours max.

That's a really good question. The drive may be over on it's oil change interval.

When we were checking the drives in my 242, we pulled the plug and the oil came out black and stinky. The mech said black and stinky was good. Much better than half fresh oil and half water.

Stinky dirty even black oil is good, it shows that the lubricant is doing it's job. What's even more remarkable is I've pulled apart drives that were "almost" all water, the liquid that ran out was the consistency of chocolate milk but overall the drive was in pretty good shape and didn't require any hard labor to re-seal and test. I'm amazed at the amount of torture some of the available drives go through and live to push again.

i cannot see where black and stinky good? of course better than water but stinky?

Those were his exact words. What I think he meant is that there are no leaks.

Change the oil at fifteen hours and see if the same condition exists. Oil is cheap the drive is not.
The burned smell is of concern, if something is running hotter than is should you will know by changing your oil sooner.
I don't know how you can define a burn smell, that stuff is the worst smelling stuff I have encountered, when you get it on your hands even after washing them three or four times they still stink
Good luck and keep us posted if you find a problem.
Brian

Black and stinky could be good............