Grey coloured turret fluid

mitch_f1 · Postby **mitch_f1** » Sat Jul 12, 2014 6:50 pm

So I just changed the turret oil, and it can't be more than about 30,000kms old, but it is silver colour and had a certain sparkle to it. It is worth noting at this point that the car crunches 3rd gear almost every time. Could it be something in the turret that is worn and needs replacing?

Thanks

MrRevhead · Postby **MrRevhead** » Sat Jul 12, 2014 8:21 pm

Have you changed the nylon bush at the bottom of the shifter?

I add a small amount of Nulon Smooth Shift in with my turret oil. It makes a noticeable difference in shift.

mitch_f1 · Postby **mitch_f1** » Sat Jul 12, 2014 8:23 pm

Bush was new with my short shifter at about the same time as the oil. The box itself has G70 in it which helps, and I've recently put G70 in the turret, see how that goes.

hks_kansei · Postby **hks_kansei** » Sat Jul 12, 2014 9:31 pm

Every gear turret one every MX5 I've seen has the same coloured oil/grease.

Pretty sure Mazda use grease from factory, most likely it's some sort of graphite grease like in wheel bearings.

I wouldn't be concerned.

93_Clubman · Postby **93_Clubman** » Sun Jul 13, 2014 12:47 pm

Yeah, the turret oil often looks like that after a while.

hks_kansei wrote:Pretty sure Mazda use grease from factory, most likely it's some sort of graphite grease like in wheel bearings.

Mazda's workshop manual says to use oil in GB turret - it was on one of the factory manual pages that manga_blue linked to in the past few years.

mitch_f1 · Postby **mitch_f1** » Sun Jul 13, 2014 1:21 pm

I figured as much in regard to graphite lube but this is also the fourth time at least that I've changed the oil in about 50k kms of ownership

93_Clubman · Postby **93_Clubman** » Sun Jul 13, 2014 1:36 pm

Yeah, does seem to happen quicker in your GB with that short shifter - the quality on some of the short shifters was pretty average. My turret oil was similar when I bought mine at 45k kms & 10 years old, but the turret oil probably hadn't been changed. Shifter self-centring was also a bit intermittent, but oil change sorted it.