Lube

[Stephen Borud]

I'm making a few cakes of lube today. This lube is made up of 1/3 beeswax, to 2/3 by weight of Jojoba oil. It works very well for hunting.

Stephen

[Don McDowell]

That jojoba oil is some handy stuff.

[Kurt]

Stephen.

The next time you get a nice fat Speed Goat or Elk, trim the fat and render it out till it is hard. White fat will get a little harder then yellow. The yellow will be actually better for lube it feels like STP on a screwdriver blade, you cant pinch it enough to hold on to it and mix it with Vaseline to the hardness you feel you need. I mix mine 50/50 by weight. Sure works very good.
That cake below is from my last buff. The processor didn't save much for me but that cake will last me for a while.
It had mostly yellow fat and it took longer to get it hard the way I like but it is good stuff.
That yellow cake turned pure white sitting in the open air in a couple months. I been using it and it sure is fine stuff for load and shoot.

[Stephen Borud]

Kurt how do you render it! I've often thought about trying it. I've read several accounts over the years where the old timers used it for lube! An elk would have a Good amount, not sure I want to make an extra trip or carry more weight on my back when I pack it out though . The antelope and deer that I've killed here don't get the mass amounts of fat build up like I saw when I hunted back home in ND. They don't have the fields of wheat and etc.

Stephen

[Kurt]

Stephen

I grind the fat through a meat grinder using the course blade so it releases more of the fat.
I use a 5 gallon stock pot, that cake is laying on the one I use and I put enough water in the pot so it covers the fat and put it on a hotplate outside, you don't want that smell cooking it on your Wife's range in the Kitchen LOL.
That batch of yellow fat took me several days adding water several times to cook down. The first time I let it simmer for about 8 hours and let it set and cool over night. The next morning I lifted the cake out of the water and scraped the jell off the bottom and set it aside and cooked the mix left in the pot again and that gave me about another inch after it cooled.
Scraping the cake off again I dumped the water and cracklins in the pot out in the fence row. It make good Coyote bait
This time I put the cakes back in a pot of water and let it simmer under a little higher heat and let the water just about cook out and added more and at the end of the day I just let it cool and the next morning I scrape off the jell again and I have a old freezer that don't work anymore and I use it for storage for things like this.
This batch I had to render a little longer because of the yellow fat. Normally with white fat it would take 8-10 hours and it would be as hard as a candle.
It's a little time consuming but the effort is worth it.

Kurt

[Stephen Borud]

My wife was in class today that's why I made lube in the house . I think it smells good. The boys thought I was cooking something. Thanks for the advice.

Stephen

[Kurt]

I bet it smelled like honey

[Stephen Borud]

They thought I was making corn bread with honey on it!

[bruce moulds]

steven,
at what temperature would that lube melt?
keep safe,
bruce.

[Stephen Borud]

I don't know Bruce. I've used this lube In all sorts of weather from below zero to over a 100 degrees and never had had an issue.

Stephen