Thread: 55,000km 4.5 year oil change??? Diesel oil in petrol V8

I picked up a 1999 V8 D2 about 3 weeks ago, bought it unseen and drove it home about 1100kms.
Drove beautifully and was impressed with the power and smoothness of the engine and gear box.
Just before my trip home I checked the usual things water level, oil etc and noticed the dipstick came out looking pretty black, as I usually only drive diesels I thought it a bit odd but didn't think too much of it.

So last night I did an oil change, bought some Castrol GTX 15w40 and a Mahle oil filter and set too work.
Upon draining the oil I was a little concerned as the oil seemed to be a bit thinner than I would expect, was very black and quite a bit of sludge. Thought that was definitely due an oil change.
Then the excitement really began, the oil filter felt like it was welded in place, is was so tight I bent my filter wrench all out of shape and had to use a long screwdriver to get more leverage on the strap wrench. Upon removing the filter I found some interesting information written on it.
See picture below:
Bing Bon Oil filter.jpg

If you can't read it, someone has written on it 139,153km and 27/2/13.
Now I assume this is when it was last changed, and considering that was 53,900km and 4 and a half years ago it's no wonder it was black and sludgy!

I had no option but to carry out the oil change with my current oil, which I did with no hiccups, no engine light and seemed to run ok.

Just after some ideas on what to do. If the engine is buggered there is nothing I can do, but I don't think it is.
I has read a lot of posts online saying that full synthetic oil can help with cleaning out sludge, despite possibly not being the best oil for the engine.
And read of quite a few people running diesel engine oil in the Rover V8, to aid with cleaning of sludge but also the diesel oil is thought to have more Zinc and anti-wear properties that can help with the old school V8.

I'm more than happy to run 15w40 Diesel oil as I've got heaps of it for my 300tdi, but was to know if any folk here are using it.
I've always been told not to do an engine oil flush as it can just cause the sludge to get dislodged into places you don't want it, but have read of a lot of people using ATF as an engine oil flush with great success.
Any advice would be much appreciated.

I'm thinking of calling the previous owner and asking when he thinks the last oil change was done, he seemed a good guy and had taken great pride and care with the vehicle.
Perhaps he was a good liar, or the garage he took it too was ripping him off.

Cheers

Be prepared for a lot of new oil leaks.
The oil was thin because the viscosity adders would of all been broken down so it was just the base oil viscosity.

I would do a flush on current oil but dont drop straight away let sit then warm it up again. When ya drop the oil leave the filter then with some cheap oil do a 2nd flush a few hours next day.
Then put fresh diesel oil like a rx super in it tjen just leave at regular servicing with diesel oil.

But this likely to clean around all the seals so good chance they will start leaking. The lifters beong cleaned out was well good chance they will be come noisy.

So long as it hasent been under a lot of load or stressed to hard bearings should be fine. But if you pulled them out their will be a lot of scratchs on them as you have t had an oil filter for a while and its been by passing