Gas in the catch can
 

Preface: In October I was driving and had an line come loose on my oil cooler where it attached to the oil filter assembly. Lost a fair amount of oil but shut off the car (I think) in time. Shop gave me new oil and I've done a track day and thousands of miles since without issue that I can tell. But I hadn't checked the catch can in a while.

Just emptied out my Radium Catch Can tonight and while I didn't take pics, it looked like a nice light brown latte and stank of gasoline. Decent amount in there too. I'm assuming it was a mixture of gas, oil, and water. Dipstick shows nothing like that; just typical oil. I'm thinking my fiasco in October screwed things up some, because previously there would be almost nothing in the catch can.

Anything to worry about? Thoughts? Keeping an eye on it for sure from now on.

brown latte is cause of oil and water mixing, water from condensation build up on the inside of the catch can walls. the catch can does not get hot enough like the engine does to burn off the moisture. if ur catch can just holds the oil u have nothing to worry about, if the catch can drains the return oil back into the oil pan then that oil/water mixture will be problematic.

Yep, I'd suggest you clean it up and check it from time to time .....;)


humfrz

If its brown latte like or almost brown milkshake like it's moisture like another poster said. A picture would help us a bit better. But normally it looks like this in some catch cans including what mine used to look like:

https://i.imgur.com/wWDdGX4.jpg?1


Also as for the gas smell you have to understand in this DI/PI setup it's normal get fuel vapors in the PCV. Also understand the catch can is catching anything that would blow past the rings into the engine or from inside the cylinder , so that includes oil and moisture, and of course fuel but as a vapor. It then begins to condensate in the catch can and mix together into that rank oil, water fuel mix. The older our cars get the more I feel we'll be seeing this question again as the PCV gases increase a bit.

If you are worried get an oil analysis done and also empty the catch can more periodically. But this is mostly normal.