soy wax as a boolit lube ingredient?

A friends wife makes candles and uses a soy based wax rather than paraffin or beeswax sighting lower smoke as a reason.

Has anyone tried it in a boolits lube recipe?

I also understand it to have a rather low melting point.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/goog...&sa.x=8&sa.y=4

Lot of threads linked to this search page.

yes.
it adds a silkiness and a feathering capability to bees-wax that's hard to get elsewhere.
I get mine from the candles stuff too.

I use Soy wax as well as Ozokerite wax.
I bought a 50# bag of Soy wax for around $3.95 a pound in the 80's or 90's ??? and still have about a 3 gallon bucket full. My wax blend melts at 175 degrees. One thing using Soy wax and that is you need a blend mixed so it sticks in the lube grooves. A mix of Soy with Vasiline and some peanut oil makes a very good black powder lube.

I've read that petroleum oil products (the Vasiline) should not be an ingredient in bullet lubes to be shot with real Black Powder. As the heat evaporates off lighter components of the Vaseline it thickens it and when combined with the carbon BP fouling it forms a tar that requires strong detergents or solvents to remove. Making clean up appear a much harder task to some that is used to using water based BP cleaning methods. The Vaseline component is supposed to be fine with smokeless powders which clean up with nitro powder solvents. I supose if a shooter was used to cleaning with nitro solvents the extra work to remove the vasiline tar plus the much larger quantity of BP fouling that will be present, might be viewed as a little more shocking as compared to his nitro powder clean up regime.

It would be nice if soy wax could replace the bees wax component used in most lube recipes. I suspect it maybe cheaper and or more readily available than bees wax.
Perhaps a soy wax mixed with Crisco, anhydrous lanolin and a little caster oil might make a suitably soft bullet lube for use with BP. Hopefully it could made not to run out in hot weather or be too stiff in cold weather be dead on accurate under all conditions, the holly grail of lube design.

:smile: Let me let you in on a little bullet lube secret. :smile:
Vaseline was invented sometime around the 1870's and shortly after it came around it was used for bullet lubes. If you would read some of the old forest and Stream publications from back in the 1880's you will find it mentioned and in some of the old gun catalogs. Pope used it in some of his lubes.
I have used it straight for patch lube since I was a Kid and it cleans up just as well as B-Wax and Sperm oil before it was banned and what ever none petroleum mixes written. When some one makes a post about using Vaseline in black powder lubes and it turns to tar has never shot a black powder load using it.
My best lube I have ever made is made with Ozokerite, Vaseline, Castor oil and something to make it stick in the grooves. Second is Soywax with Vaseline and a few other additives to make it flexible and so it stays in the lube grooves.
If straight Vaseline on a patch does not make "tar" in the muzzle loading rifle that I have experienced I don't know where all this stuff has started.
I can shoot a whole 30 shot muzzle loading match with out having to clean the bore to seat the ball. Also in my PP loads I shoot.

Kurt

My readings in muzzleloading forums of a hard to remove tar formation created by black powder burning in the presents of Vaseline has keep me from trying it in my muzzleloader. Perhaps I will try it and any other type of petroleum based grease.

I'm with Leadpot. I started using paraffin, Vaseline and STP as a black powder lube (Darr's lube) in a .451 Creedmoor Rigby muzzle loader years upon years ago. I've never had any problem with the lube, fouling or cleanup. Flush it out with soap and water, rinse with water, dry patch to remove most of the water, some WD40 to remove all the water and a good gun oil.

When using soy wax instead of beeswax, do you substitute 1 to 1?

Thanks

Sawdust.
It depends on the season. I normally use a very soft lube almost like soft butter for my PP bullets. Yes 50/50 melted in liquid stage mix is a good place to start. I add a little pure coconut butter. It takes the heat well when the temp gets hot and I have not had problems it getting past my wad stack into the powder.
I also like using tallow I make from Deer and Buffalo fat. That hard tallow works as well as anything I have ever used.

Here is a little 1890's history of bullet lubes and a lot of good reading pertained to loading and casting giving you a inside of how things were done by the ODG's
I been using Vaseline for patch lube and all of my lubed bullets black and smokeless powder since the 50's when a old man I only knew by the name of "Spike" took me under his wings in 1952 or 53 when MOM took me to his gun shop to teach me how to shoot a .22 to put meat on the table for her and me when things were tough. My Dad was killed during the war. We shot a lot of the old Ballards and Stevens rifles and one of the things he told me was the B-wax and Vaseline lubes for cast bullets and round ball patch lube. It has always been my add too in my mixes.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?...ew=1up;seq=301

Lead Pot, Thanks for the reply.

Looking to make a lube for pan lubing for GG bullets, to shoot BPCR, that will work for high temp, low humidity conditions. Wanted to substitute SW or OZ wax for beeswax. The SW has been a little crumbly/grainy compared to the BW.

Interesting read about bullet lube. I've made notes about your use of Vaseline. Had to look up what "plumbago" meant. Since, I only pan lube and reuse the cake with holes in it, won't help me.

I'll keep messing with SW and OZ.

While Vaseline may work, I doubt it seasons a barrel.

Yes Soy wax is crumbly and it need something to bind it for use with a GG bullet. I don't shoot GG just PP so the crumbling is not a problem for my use.
The hard Tallow I make and use also is like you found with soy or the OZ wax. A good way to test your lube is by the star on the muzzle. Even if that star is dry just cup your hand over the end and exhale. If the lube is any good and hydrate (gets greasy) it's working. This is important if the blow tube is used. Some lubes I made might have a greasy coating on the muzzle but the viscosity keeping the lead from smearing is poor. A wet lube star is not always a sign the lube is good.
:) I don't know what "plumbago" is either. Sounds like a word Jimmy Durandy used :)

Yes, using a blowtube.

"plumbago" = graphite

Hola wax, soy Charles.

I used straight beef tallow as a bullet lube with the Lyman 311291 bullet in a .30-06 during the late 50's.Seemed to work OK.

Quote:

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My readings in muzzleloading forums of a hard to remove tar formation created by black powder burning in the presents of Vaseline has keep me from trying it in my muzzleloader.

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Vaseline is a wax jelly from the drilling process of oil. It is akin to paraffin that is an alkaline with a long hydro carbon chain which produces a good lube component for both smokeless and black powder. The benefit of Vaseline is it has a longer hydro carbon chain that paraffin.
An ideal lube with all these components of long hydro carbon chains is pure sheep tallow - Vaseline and Beeswax

here in parts of oz, there can be trouble with lube melting in summer.
this can be dealt with by having a summer lube and a winter lube, but to be honest this is a pain in the proverbial.
while some petrolium products are bad news for black powder, some are ok.
vaseline in mentioned in 19th century writings, both brit and american, as being good.
my own feeling on this is currently that if you use any petrolium products in a lube, then make that lube completely of petrolium products.
this might include ozokerite,paraffin, vaseline, and some oils.
the beauty of ozokerite is that it will raise the melting point of lubes.
there are ozokerites and paraffins that have higher or lower melting points, and homework needs to be done prior to ordering.
likewise with animal and plant based products.
beeswax, tallow, lanolin, and vegetable oils come to mind.
of the readily makeable tallows, sheep has the highest melting point.
coconut oil melts at about body temp, while other oils are liquid at room temp.
lanolin and beeswax are what they are.
ozokerite will take on more oil without bleeding than other waxes.
paraffin wax will bleed oil on a hot day without adding any oil to it. just put some on a piece of steel in the sun and see what happens.
by checking melting points of substances, you can raise the melting point of a lube substantially.
but then you have to check it for use in cold weather.
many of the old time recommmended lubes obviously worked and worked well. however, all the companies that recommended them were based in the north east of usa.
how they worked without melting prior to use in arizona in the summer is open to conjecture.
melting points of lubes can be raised by saponification.
generally heating them hotter and adding soap will cause this to happen. they froth up.
but they can then only be used through a lubrisizer, pan lubing being impossible.
they might make good lube wads if you could pour them to the right thickness prior to initial cooling.
keep safe,
bruce.

Bruce you can pour a very consistently uniform thickness lube for wads that will not vary in thickness from side to side.
This is how I make my lube wad cake. I use a round 12" straight wall cake pan and put about a 1/2" of water in it and put it on a hot plate. Next I weigh out 280 grams of my lube and put it in the water to heat and simmer so it mixes in the water and then turn off the heat and let it cool. when it is cool I lift out the solid cake of lube that is 3/16" thick through out the cake. Just wipe off the bottom that was in the water and your good to go for using the shell case to cut the lube wad.

When I mix my secret :roll: [smilie=1: lube I use a deep fryer with water and put the witches brew in it and let it boil for a short spell this mixes it well and also adds some moisture to the lube, maybe just water molecules but I think it aids to adding moisture to keep the fouling softer because my lube works well. Let it cool and when cool the lube cake comes out in fine shape and just wipe off the bottom that was in the water. This keeps the lube from getting ruined from over heating also it will keep some lubes from spoiling that might have some components in it that will turn rancid in time. When lube smokes it's junk.........Kurt