No, no - didn't pull them to show the pattern - pulled them to sell.
I'm kinda puzzled by the comment "looks good for used gears". What do you mean by that? How do used gears set up differently? Curious about that.
The gears were new, installed in an axle about 4 years ago (IIRC). Never run power through them (never finished the project/axle). I decided to sell them because they are no longer going to be used with that project vehicle. The "crud" you see is probably dust/dirt from sitting on my workbench in the barn. Never seen water, zero fatigue cycles, etc., etc. Or, the "crud" maybe just the extra pattern paste that squeezed out during the gear setup. Being my first setup I went a little "nutty" with the amount of paste I used. And the stuff that came with the set up package kinda sucked as well - almost the consistency of chunky vaseline. If you were to wash the gears in the tank they would look 100% pristine.
r@m