Interesting score, Moby Dick oil

[plastikosmd]

I visited my old friend again. He is getting too old for the hobby.

I picked up muzzle blast mags from late 1940s-late 1960s should make for some good reading



And maybe 7 oz (of an 8oz bottle) of sperm whale oil



Found it online, interesting



I probably won’t try it in anything but my slug guns

[Daryl]

That's pretty rich. How do you know it is unopened? Because they said so?

[PhDBrewer]

Neat!
That brings back memories!  As a child, It was in the garage. Don't know what happened to it...
Thanks for sharing.
William

[bones92]

I like the book on 45-70 rifles.   

[plastikosmd]

I haven’t checked it out yet.
I only have. 50-110 but maybe some of tricks or hints (or whatever is in the book) will translate

[stubshaft]

I'm old enough to remember when Brownells sold sperm whale oil!

[Daryl]

Seems to me I bought some in the 1970's, but cannot remember from where.
Might have been at Kesselring's in Alger Wash. or Yeager's in Bellingham, mid 70's.

[Bob Roller]

Maybe I have some sperm oil in the shop.I remember having some and got it from Wes Kindig befire 1973,the tear Wes passed away.
Bob Roller

[Nordnecker]

I wished I could find some sperm oil for something some years ago. I don’t remember exactly why. I might have found some at a flea market but the bottle was unmarked. It had a very odd smell.
Does this bottle that you have a peculiar smell, or is it odorless?

[Daryl]

The very best patch lube I found, was when I lived in Smithers and after the moose guiding season, I walked up to the peak of Hudson's Bay Mountain is Smithers
and shot some Hoary Marmots, then cleaned them, put the inner fat into zip-locks bags. I fried out the oil and it was absolutely amazing. The next year, I wanted some
more, but the gvt. declared them protected the next summer, so that was it. After I used up that marmot oil, there was no longer an opportunity to get some.
They also tasted very good, btw.

[Hungry Horse]

 O.K. I guess it’s time to come clean. In 1969 I was in junior collage in Eureka California. And, like most college students was flat broke. I took any odd job I could get, and believe me Eureka has no shortage of odd jobs. So one day I got asked to clean out an old warehouse down by the docks. Like a lot of Eureka the warehouse was ancient. Two of us college kids set to work clearing a ton of old stuff that probably belonged in a museum. After about three days of loading stuff we were finally to the back wall where there were two large doors separated by a work bench. When we looked under the workbench there were rows of one gallon cans stacked up from the floor to the bottom of the bench. The labels were long gone, and the cans were rusty everywhere the contents of the can hadn’t touched it. I opened a can and got a whiff of something I couldn’t identify. I put a little on my finger and decided it was some kind of oil. Years later when I had started shooting muzzleloaders an old timer named Bill Lauderback showed me a small bottle of whale oil, and let me open the bottle and smell it. At that moment I knew I had thrown away about forty gallons of whale oil.

[BillS]

I used to buy and use sperm oil in the early 1960s and probably bought this bottle about 1964-1966 at the Log Cabin Shop or at their booth at Friendship.  Perhaps the most spectacular hang fire I ever had with a flintlock was about 1964 when I had probably over lubed the bore with sperm oil and didn't get it all swabbed out before loading and shooting.  From 1968 through the 1980s, college, work, and family significantly limited my shooting but I saved this bottle and its limited contents for the nostalgia, and it survived three moves in Ohio and one to South Dakota in 2013.  I can't quite make out the top of the label, but it looks like: Moby Dick, 48^o NW SPERM OIL. 

[Staredge]

As a sailor with a strong interest in the history of whaling, I really want to smell whale oil. I’ve heard it has a smell of its own.

[Nordnecker]

^ I share your interest. You might enjoy reading “The Empty Ocean” by Richard Ellis.