Considering a change to my boolit lube

[country gent]

Im currently making emmerts improved lube for BP bullet lube ( cartridge guns).

The recipe Im currently using is
50% beeswax
40% unsalted crisco
5% canola oil
5% canola oil

Im thinking of trying JOJOBBA oil for the canola oil.

[challenger_i]

Im currently making emmerts improved lube for BP bullet lube ( cartridge guns).

The recipe Im currently using is
50% beeswax
40% unsalted crisco
5% canola oil
5% canola oil

Im thinking of trying JOJOBBA oil for the canola oil.

Jojo works pretty good. Might add in a couple percent oleic acid (excellent emulsifier and is a good rust inhibitor).
For funsies, try exchanging unsalted lard for the Crisco.

[country gent]

I did try it once the crisco lasts longer and seems slightly better.
I omitted I do use a couple drops of murphies oil soap or dawn to help blend every thing

[challenger_i]

Your inbox be full!

[country gent]

Thanks for letting me know its got some room now

[Minerat]

I start out with 50% bee and 50% white unsalted crisco. I go by the pound since my wife buys crisco in one pound sticks. Once blended I add a 1/2 a green crayon and 4 fluid oz of olive oil and let it setup to check consistency. I add 2oz at a time until it gets soft enough to spread on a cloth patch without melting it first. About like saddle soap. I tried a couple of menthol crystals to make it smell nice once but it made me crave life savers so I quit that.

I pan lube my 459-535 BPCR boolits, hot lube my felt ads for ROA 45 cal and patches in the TC 54 cal hawkens.

[Hip's Ax]

I shot Emmert's Modified (50% beeswax, 40% Crisco, 5% lanolin, 5% jojoba oil) for years in mid and long range BPCR paper target matches and it shot really, really well. Noticed after a year, definitely 2 with left over loaded ammo, the bullets were tough to rotate (I slip fit, not resize) and I would occasionally loose half a cartridge case up the barrel. It was just part of life, I'd use the left over ammo for practice, if it got really old I'd put the rounds in my kinetic bullet puller and get them to move and rotate, so at least I had a path forward. One year a friend won the long range match with 3 year old ammo and I asked what lube he was using, Pope's. I got the recipe from him and its all I use now for some years, old ammo no longer attaches to the case. Only annoyance is Pope is so slippery that with my slip fit ammo I have to lay the ammo box on its side so the bullet doesn't slide out when I pick one up.

[greenjoytj]

Watch out for lube problems caused by Crisco shortening.

Some years back I wanted to make up some more Emmerts lube. When I got out my large 64 oz can that I saved well covered to melt and mix all the ingredients I do this double boiler style setting the can in a larger pot the has just enough water in it to prevent the melting can from floating.
I discovered 3 problems in the can:
1) The condition of the inside can was rusting right under a millimetre of old lube. (This was a tomato can so the steel has a white plastic coating except at the seam).
2) The remnants of the original Emmerts lube that was still in the can was corroding the can seam. Fuzzy feathers of corrosion were growing from the can seam.
3) Bullets previously lubed with Emmerts in 2017 were also showing a fuzzy white corrosion on the lead where the lube touched lead.

The first problem I saw was lots of tiny pin size dots of red rust forming under the thin layer of lube that was left in the can after the lube was made and poured into molds.
A thin coat of lube had cooled and solidified to the inside of the can coating the metal.
I saw rust forming under this thin layer of lube.
I thought the steel can should have been well protected from rust under a thin layer of solidified lube.
Something in the lube was causing the steel to rust!

The second problem that I saw appeared on the inside seam on the can.
A fin-like growth of a greyish white powdery substance (corrosion) was growing 1 to 2 mm straight out of the can seam for the full length of the seam wherever the original Emmerts lube was coating the metal. This corrosion was growing straight out of the seam like crystals.
These crystals were very delicate, when the can was bumped these crystals broke off and fell to the bottom of the can to pile up at the base of the seam like cigarette ash.

The can seam looks like its soldered, I dont know what type of solder was used. The lube was reacting to the type of solder used and to the steel of the can.
This may explain why I see a similar type growth on my 20:1 lead:tin cast bullets that had been sized and lubed with Emmerts a few years prior to discovering the problems occurring in the can now.
I had not looked into my lube melting can since I covered it and put it away in Feb 2017, that was more than 6 years ago.
I suspect that it is the Crisco shortening and the citric acid ingredient that Crisco is made with, that is chemically reacting with the lead or tin in the can seam and on my cast bullets.

From the Crisco website, the ingredients: Soybean Oil, Fully Hydrogenated Palm Oil, Palm Oil, Mono and Diglycerides, TBHQ, and Citric Acid (Antioxidants).
I suspect its the citric acid component in the Crisco shortening.
I substituted soy wax for the Crisco shortening ingredient in all my next lube batches. I wont use Crisco in any future lubes.

Jojoba oil is known to be a replacement for whale oil and my source for Jojoba oil is Lubegard Premium Universal Lubricant. I studied the Lubegard web site where they explain how the many automotive products use Jojoba oil. I use this Universal oil in all my bullet lube batches and as a gun oil. It is great stuff.

Beso-cala-jo.v3 (version 3). Named after its ingredients. This is the lube I will be using in 2026.
This is a new lube formula. I made version 3 on 23 February 2026.
Base Base
Ingredient list % and grams
1) Beeswax. 50% 50 g Beeswax % quantity stayed the same as in V2.
2) Soy Wax 15% 15 g Soy wax quantity was reduced by 9% from V2.
3) Carnauba 2% 2 g Carnauba wax % quantity was doubled over V2.
4) Lanolin 5% 5 g Lanolin % quantity stayed the same as in V2.
5) Jojoba Oil + 28% + 28 g Oil quantity % up 8% more than in V2.
Totals 100% 100 g 100 gram batch makes two 50 g sticks.

This new lube recipe has worked with black powder in 45 Colt fired in a revolver and with smokeless CFE-Pistol in an M73 24” barrel rifle.

[country gent]

At campbells and moist food plants Soldered seams ( before my time were soldered with pure lead. later when lead was deemed a hazard pure tin was used in place of the lead, around the later part of this time technology introduced the 2 piece can and welded side seams.