>weither the bearings were causing the knock or not the weird
>marks worry me doug.

The weird marks are a little deceiving in the pics... and the upper bearing halves looked different as well... they are worn more evenly and you can see the "dust layer" picking up minor dust particles. The initial "dust coating" hasn't fully worn off yet. It's actually not wearing of the bearing we're looking at... it's wearing off of the original coatings. The bearing isn't worn at all... it's still perfectly smooth to the touch. In a little while, the entire bearing will have a polished look to it... nice and even. On a side note, all rod bearing oil clearences were between .040 and .050 mm... which is right where I want it to be. The plastigauge markings are even along the gauge as well... so the crank grind is good.

>the only thing synthetic would do that would be bad is make
>the rings take longer to seat if they weren't already

That's what I said... once the rings are seated, which is WELL under 1000 miles, synthetic oil is just fine to use.

>^^ that is the major reason most people recomend breakign the
>motor in on mineral oil not to mention its cheaper when your
>swapping out oil left and right in the begining stages of a
>new motor...

Right.

Also, the bits are pieces I found in the oil are from the new parts breaking in. I guess I exagerated a little here... once I thought I found the problem, I jumped to conclusions. Another valuable lesson learned here.