They should never put oil in a white pail

Bob Bancroft · Oct 24, 2017

Elderly neighbor passed away a while back. His family wanted me to have some items for having helped him over the years. So I got a few jugs of oil. I dumped an unopened 5 gal. pail of 15W-40 today, and was not pleased to see sediment in the bottom. Not much, but a little bit of dark stuff. Didn't see any in the black pail!
I get my engine and hyd. oil in barrels. Maybe there's a residue in them, but I don't see it. Is ignorance bliss ?

Brendon Warren · Oct 24, 2017

You see it in the bottom of the yellow pails of hydraulic oil from TSC as well.

Steve@Advance · Oct 24, 2017

I found that in some hydraulic oil pails once. It was the Econo Lube brand from a local supplier.

It was really nasty, not just some discoloration, but obvious gritty contamination.

Next time I was there I told them about it. Said that they had discontinued that brand, not because of complaints, but because they got a better deal on another brand.

I asked if it was any better. "Oh yes much better!"

I continued to question them about the other, they finally told me "You should not have bought it, that was the cheap stuff for old equipment that leaks a lot".

"So, anything I need to know about this before I buy it?"

I went ahead and bought it. I was sure watching what came out of the pail. It looked good though.

RBoots · Oct 24, 2017

Yep, seen it as well

Ross

dlbuck · Oct 24, 2017

I noticed the same thing in gallon jug of chainsaw bar oil.

retired farmer · Oct 24, 2017

I never use the oil in the very bottom of a pail. Always sediment floating in it seems like.

Liquid_wrench · Oct 24, 2017

I keep nylon strainers here for straining paint that skins up before I run it thru my sprayers...they are 190 micron and come in 1 gallon or 5 gallon size..with elastic to hold them on a bucket...I also use them for oils that I buy in larger containers. with heavy gear oil...you have to squeeze the bag,to get it thru. I rinse them out with mineral spirits and reuse them. I buy them from Sherwin Williams...and I think lowes has them also.

Keith

fixerupper · Oct 24, 2017

Years ago the owner of a local Standard Oil station always used individual quarts of oil when he did oil changes in customers cars. This was back in the day when the quart container was steel or cardboard and you stabbed the funnel into the top. One day dad asked him why he didn't get a 55 gallon drum like the other oil stations did. A 55 gallon drum is a lot cheaper per quart. He told dad "when you take the top off a 55 gallon drum you should see all the crud in the bottom of the drum". Dad didn't question him even he knew there was a little crud in the bottom of every quart can too.

I have taken the top off of many oil drums here on the farm and I haven't noticed more than maybe a quarter teaspoon of crud if even that much in the bottom.

showcrop · Oct 24, 2017

I have always gotten some pale yellow solid from the bottom of 55 gal drums when tipping them up to get the last of it. I was told that it is wax, that it is normal, and it will dissolve quickly.

sms · Oct 24, 2017

I know someone that rebuilt the engine in his payloader, it almost immediately failed, he knew he did nothing wrong. He had the oil tested and they were able to prove that some of the solution used to clean the drums before filling had been left in the drum before oil was added.

Russ from MN · Oct 24, 2017

I saw something similar in the bottom of a jug of JD hydraulic oil, I think white pails are a good
idea!

SW EM · Oct 24, 2017

Oil drums typically have the most contaminants and the largest contaminants out of all the containers oils and hydraulic fluids come in. Plastic quart bottles have the least. Either way, if your system requires very clean fluid, it is recommended that it be strained through the appropriate filter when poured into your equipment.

I am in a hydraulic power class currently at ISU, and we just covered a section regarding fluid contaminants and filtering systems. We were shocked at how dirty new fluid actually is when under a microscope, and it is common to have new fluid not meet the cleanliness requirements for equipment. Looks clean to the naked eye... however these impurities can harm a system over time and increase wear.

Definitely won't hesitate to change a filter out of inconvenience anymore!

IndianaSteve · Oct 24, 2017

I'm not sure that it's not just some of the additives they put in the oil. It seems no matter what brand of oil or petroleum fluid I buy there is something in the bottom. Hope I'm right. Maybe optimistic?

IA Roy · Oct 24, 2017

When I worked at the terex crane factory in Waverly, the procedure was to run new oil thru a filtration system before it went in the hydraulic tank on the crane.

CCer · Oct 25, 2017

I gather the new oil containers after the techs dump the oil. Usually a little remains in every container. I let the containers drip thru a fine screen or filter, into a clean jug. Then the plastic goes in the recycle bin. I haven't purchased any oils in years.

Bret4207 · Oct 25, 2017

Considering the amount of crap you find in the oil pan of any piece of equipment and that we're using high detergent oils that tend to keep that stuff in suspension, I'm not going to lose sleep over a tiny bit of "black stuff" in the bottom of a 5 gallon pail of oil no matter what color it is, and yes, I agree this is a run on sentence- sorry! :lol:

BarnyardEngineering · Oct 25, 2017

Isn't this why we have OIL FILTERS?

Bruce from Can. · Oct 25, 2017

New Oil !!! You guys can buy New OIL!!! HOLY SH@T!!! Things must be a whole lot better there then here!!! We can get all the free oil we want at the dump , and it is already dirty, saves a lot of work thickening it. lol.
I have always turn the pail upside down to drain into another pail, and use it for squirt cans , or on baler chain oiler.

K Effective · Oct 25, 2017

We were having some contamination issues with hydraulic fluid at work, determined from sampling the barrels of new fluid that it was not up to our standards coming right from the manufacturer. We now transfer it into the tank via a cleanup filter rig- much slower than the transfer pump, but less issues. We also installed some super-whamodine electrostatic filtering devices to clean up the whole volume.

CenTex Farmall · Oct 25, 2017

Not surprising. No doubt it's debris and not additives. If you've ever seen people doing big maintenance projects in large manufacturing facilities......well, some people are more careful than others and some not so much. This includes food facilities too. All kinds of opportunities for crud to get into systems. Management typically wants a line back up and running by yesterday.

Pre-filtering is probably a good idea. I've noticed residue at the bottom of jugs and five gallon buckets so probably something I should look into.

showcrop · Oct 25, 2017

(quoted from post at 12:52:26 10/25/17) Not surprising. No doubt it's debris and not additives. If you've ever seen people doing big maintenance projects in large manufacturing facilities......well, some people are more careful than others and some not so much. This includes food facilities too. All kinds of opportunities for crud to get into systems. Management typically wants a line back up and running by yesterday.

Pre-filtering is probably a good idea. I've noticed residue at the bottom of jugs and five gallon buckets so probably something I should look into.

Centex, that is quite the charge you make there. The company that I work for is in the business of setting up food industries plant's cleaning systems, trying personal to use them properly, then make regular service visits including audits, to insure that procedures are being followed. What do you offer to back up your claims?

daisyman · Oct 25, 2017

We had a filtration system of three filters that we used in the hydraulics on our CNC lathes and mills in the factory I worked for. We had some techs come and inspect our oil and sent it in to a lab for testing, and then showed us what the filtered oil looked like. You couldn't believe the difference. Those hydraulic valves meter out oil in microscopic amounts and any particle that gets in there makes for a bad day. We figured the filters, though quite expensive, were really cheap in the long run.

Irv :wink:

rustred · Oct 25, 2017

perfectly normal, just because its new oil they dont filter it down to that fine of a micron.

RedMF40 · Oct 26, 2017

Fair warning: nothing to do with oil.
Mom was little girl in 1930s and they made their own root beer as a fun thing to do. Used reclaimed bottles. The dark-colored ones. Always enjoyed their frosty root beers til one day a bottle exploded, scattered dead spiders and what-not that had been down there in the bottom.

They should never put oil in a white pail

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