I took the advice offered by the group and sent a sample of the oil in question to Blackstone labs. They seemed to give the car a clean bill of health. Here is what they wrote:
“ED: You may have seen some metal flakes in your oil but it appears your engine is wearing just fine after your 5000-mile oil run. The universal averages for typical wear metals in oil from the 2.7L 6-cylinder are based on 7500 miles of oil use so your Boxster seems to be doing well. 0.5% of the sample was gas, likely from city driving, but it didn't hurting anything. Air and oil filtration (see silicon and insolubles) appeared to be normal and the oil's viscosity was okay for a OW/40 product. Stay with the 5K-mile oil changes and check back to establish engine wear trends. Nice Porsche!”
Ed
