Great info, thanks BimmerBreaker. I misunderstood what TIS was telling me and thought all the shells should be Yellow now, but in reality the block sides are yellow and the tops coincide with the color dots on the crank balance lobes. Thanks much for the lesson!

It makes sense too, as you conclude, that the stages are for reworked crankshafts. Mine has never had been reworked which would explain why there is no "tic" mark(s) punched or etched into the number one bearing balance lobe. They must lay another mark down every time the crank gets machined to fix damage or wear.

The rod bearings are pretty straight forward: red on one side, blue on the other. There are different sizes, but I'm hopeful that I don't have to buy 16 new shells. All my main bearing shells had the top layers worn thru, but without knowing how they are made, I can't say if this layer is a sacrificial one, or a bearing layer. So I'm going to just replace all 10 of them. They are cheaper than the rod bearings thankfully.

__________________
Current
Original owner 2002 E53 X5 4.4i to 4.6i swap
2026 G80 M3 6 spd
2025 G06 X5 50e
Former
1972 Audi Fox
1986 Saab 900S
1996 BMW Z3
1998 BMW E36 M3 Sedan
2004 BMW E46 M3
2006 Audi A3 Quatro
1993 Mopar 318 Jeep Grand Cherokee
2015 V6 Jeep Grand Cherokee