Using 'Sweet Oil' on oilstones.

[bugbear]

Olive oil is considered as one of the non drying oils, which is why it has never been used in a Varnish.

The odd drip of Olive oil on my kitchen shelf goes viscous and very sticky in time.

It may not truly harden (and thence be useful as a polish) but it looks to me as if it thickens up more than enough to bugger a sharpening stone.

BugBear

 

[morfa]

I used olive oil on my cheap £5 combi stone I got when I started. It worked fine. Nearly a year later I still use the stone as a stone for sharpening manky tools. It still works fine. I do use 3-in-1 on it these days however. But for quite a while I was using olive oil and it was fine.

<bad joke alert>
G S Haydon - So bits of bone and the like is out, but using mashed up babies is ok? I'm disgusted!
</bad joke alert>

 

[RossJarvis]

The Japanese use Camellia oil for protecting steel which apparently doesn't dry. This may work on oil-stones and apparently it's often mixed with paraffin to thin out. It can be fairly cheap off Ebayazon often used for massaging, hair or other beatification purposes. You can probably buy a Gallon without complaint from the missus if you promise her it's for you to rub her down with every night!

 

[jamesicus]

When I first took woodworking class at school (1940) I remember our teacher (Mr. Lord) saying to use "light machine oil" (whatever that was) on oil stones. When I worked at Tillotson's (Burnley 1947-1950) it seemed everyone had a squirt can of some kind of light oil (?) in their toolbox for that purpose. I remember my father used my mother's Singer sewing machine oil on his stones. I presently use fine gun oil on mine.

 

[Vann]

Baby oil, heh? Why do they need to oil babies, then?

To stop them squealing?

Cheers, Vann. :wink:

 

[bugbear]

The Japanese use Camellia oil for protecting steel which apparently doesn't dry. This may work on oil-stones and apparently it's often mixed with paraffin to thin out

That doesn't sound right; the Camelia oil I got from Ice Bear (the Axminster Japanese supplier) is in a spray container - doesn't need thinning!

BugBear

 

[Harbo]

My Camellia Oil spray, which I bought a few years ago from Axy, is a mix of the oil and Mineral Oil (Paraffin).
Other Camellia Oils I have are possibly neat and slightly thicker.

Rod

 

[bugbear]

My Camellia Oil spray, which I bought a few years ago from Axy, is a mix of the oil and Mineral Oil (Paraffin).
Other Camellia Oils I have are possibly neat and slightly thicker.

Rod

I think this looks like mine (from Axy)

http://www.highlandwoodworking.com/came ... 240ml.aspx

and it is (as you) say a mixture. I'd never noticed :-(

BugBear

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I've Camellia (and it's supposed to be "cah - mell -ia" not "cah - me -lia", apparently - I didn't realise that) oil that's sold for massage that is purportedly 100% pure, that has on the label "not for human consumption". I wonder how that is, when one of it's uses is for frying oil. :?

 

[Cheshirechappie]

Thanks for the contributions, everybody!

I said I'd report back on my Olive Oil experiment. There's been a drop on a saucer in the kitchen for almost 3 days now, and it's in just the same condition as it was when it came out of the bottle. So it dries very slowly, and as Bugbear indicated above, probably doesn't dry out completely but does go stickier over a period of weeks or months. We also know that sometime between weeks and about 2000 years, it goes rancid (thanks Harbo and RichardT).

Overall conclusions - it could be used on non-porous stones such as Arkansas and slate, but it might be wise to wipe it off fully after use. Putting it on porous man-made stones might not be such a good idea, as it'll soak in, partially dry and clog the stone over a period of weeks or months. Better options are available for use on porous stones, such as light mineral oils (baby oil, light lubricating oils, and oil/paraffin mixtures, for example).

 

[Benchwayze]

I've used olive oil on chopping boards but it went rancid, so it could happen to oilstones too?
In the old days, Olive oil was rarely used for cooking in the UK and bought for medical purposes from the Chemists?

Rod

Yes Rod, and I still have a bottle somewhere! About the size of a 'mini-bottle' of spirits.

 

[Cheshirechappie]

Just a bit of a postscript, folks.

The subject arose in an entry on Chris Schwarz's blog - http://blog.lostartpress.com/2013/11/29 ... ur-graver/ - from a textbook on engraving published in 1662. This calls for the use of 'sallad oyl' to lubricate the oilstone used for whetting gravers. 'Sallad oyl' is, apparently, olive oil - so there's long precedent for using vegetable oils on oilstones.

 

[G S Haydon]

Nice trawling CC.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I wonder where the book was published? - I doubt half the world would have known what olive oil was in 1662.

 

[Cheshirechappie]

Thanks G.S. - but this was down to a lucky coincidence, not deliberate trawling. It just happened to crop up on Schwarzy's blog.

Phil - according to it's Abebooks entry (facsimile copies of the book are available using the 'Print on Demand' system) the book was published in London. Given the general political upheavals of the time, publishing it at all must have been quite an achievement.

Just out of passing interest, I did look up 'salad oil' in Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management' (pub. 1861), and she devotes about half a page to the olive and it's oil, and has several salad dressing recipes using it. I suspect it was reasonably freely available when we weren't at war with the olive-growing bits of Europe - hence it's relative scarcity during the time of WW1 and especially WW2 and it's immediate aftermath. It's popularity grew back as peace decended on the continent after all the unpleasantness.

 

[AndyT]

I wonder where the book was published? - I doubt half the world would have known what olive oil was in 1662.

London

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Faithorne

This reference http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=...age&q=history of olive oil in england&f=false suggests that Olive oil was being imported to England at least as early as the hundred years war (1337 to 1453) even if it was low grade oil that was seen as good enough for the English!

 

[Cheshirechappie]

That's interesting, Andy. If what's written there is true, the 'olive oil' probably wasn't very highly prized for culinary use (being at best third pressing, and possibly adulterated with turpentine), so spreading it on oilstones might well have been regarded as one of the few good uses for it!

 

[AndyT]

A hint for CC or anyone else looking for old books: Abe is great if you want to buy a paper copy, but if something is being offered as a print on demand title it will have been scanned and made available online somewhere. An excellent way to find books like this is the Open Library site which shows paper and online editions. For example, this is the entry for the Faithorne book. The first entry leads you to the Internet Archive site where you can read it online or download in a choice of formats.


https://openlibrary.org/search?q=faithorne&has_fulltext=true

It includes directions for making "soft varnish" using something called "virgin's wax" - I wonder what that was!

 

[Shrubby]

Olive oil would have been in the UK since the Romans - likely it fell out of general use after they withdrew
Water is a very common as a lubricant in sharpening - apparently in India water is used and my German stone has strict instructions 'to be kept free from oil and greases'
Matt

 

[bugbear]

Olive oil would have been in the UK since the Romans - likely it fell out of general use after they withdrew
Water is a very common as a lubricant in sharpening - apparently in India water is used and my German stone has strict instructions 'to be kept free from oil and greases'
Matt

Different stones need/suit different lubricants. Using the wrong one gives poor results. Some stones can be used with oil or water, but most hones exhibit much better performance when used with the "right" lubricant.

BugBear