# lard oil



## kd0afk (Jan 5, 2013)

I want to make my own lard oil. I have researched it and it seems that it is crystallized. It think you heat it to 80°c and cool it to 5°c and when it crystalizes you can press out the fat. There might be some other step, im not sure. I got my info from a scientific paper and there was a lot of technical jargon that i didn't follow. And one method calls for using atone in a vacuum with hydrocarbons.
Anyway, Monday I plan on calling an ag college and a chemistry department.
Its cheaper to use regular cutting fluid but I want to see if I can do it.


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## Jasonb (Jan 6, 2013)

Should smell nice when it all goes rancid on your machines


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## kd0afk (Jan 6, 2013)

I believe what goes rancid is taken out in the process. And the smell didn't seem to bother machinists in the old days, the wouldnt waste a drop of it. Lard itself doesn't require refrigeration.


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## goldstar31 (Jan 6, 2013)

I have been using the same 5litre( gallon) plastic can of the stuff without problems.

I went in to my local oil factor in the UK for the stuff and paid-I think-no more than £7 for all of it.

It was called Purified Lard Oil. It hasn't gone off or anything in the years, it has frozen in an unheated workshop and so on.
I can say that it isn't worth the 'fiddling about' to save a few coins and is admirable stuff.
In another one of my Worlds, I would say that it may be worth approaching a waste oil/fat refiner for the stuff.

Norman


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## Omnimill (Jan 6, 2013)

I've got some cutting compound that smells very "organic" not sure what it's made of but it smells better than some others I've used. I bought some Tallow a while back on the off chance it may be useful, is it any good in the workshop?


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## Jasonb (Jan 6, 2013)

Tallow was the traditional tapping compound mostly superseeded by more modern solutions.

Maybe I am getting lard oil mixed up with bacon fat that is said to be good for spinning and would not be as refined as lard oil.


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## goldstar31 (Jan 6, 2013)

Tallow is still used for 'wiping' lead joints. I used it in my City and Guilds Motor Vehicle Restoration 'thingy'
It is still used for joints on wind instruments! 

However, lard is simply the fat from the pig -rendered down when cooking- so bacon fat? Well, yes, but you are having salt and water and meat extracts to contend with.

As I said earlier- it is not expensive and your lathe is not quite the place to be running in salt water-which is bacon fat.


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## Omnimill (Jan 6, 2013)

The Tallow I have looks like candle wax and has no noticeable smell so I may try it for tapping just to see what it's like.  I only bought it because it's something not commonly available these days so I bought it when I saw it at a specialist event.

Not sure I'd be inclined to use Lard in the workshop though, probably attract pests of some sort!


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## goldstar31 (Jan 6, 2013)

Lard oil----- and pests!  Nothing more serious than the wasps and bees- inseason and little boys that think that I have started a MacDonalds up. 

After all, no one is more than a couple of yards from some pest or other. Cockroaches, rats, birds, mice and PEOPLE.


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## Tin Falcon (Jan 6, 2013)

Nothing wrong with what he is doing lard oil has been a standard cutting oil and tapping oil for decades . castol Moly D  one of the best tapping oils out there uses a lard oil base. 
may be cheaper to just buy a gallon. 
I agree no bacon fat on your machines.
Tin


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## gus (Jan 6, 2013)

Hey Guys,
Thanks for confirming the good use of lard. Here in Singapore we cannot use lard w/o getting into serious problems and riots. But at home why not if is good and cheap. Read about lard being used for tapping and dieing. Won't be surprise Rigid Pipe Threading Oil has got little bit of lard in it as their secret formula.
Will run over to local supermart to buy a bottle to try out.
We use coconut oil to oil carpentry saws and wood planers.


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## goldstar31 (Jan 6, 2013)

Gus, 
          I'm fully aware of the implications( not here, though
I have a note of 3 parts olive oil, 2 parts white spirit(turps substitute) and 1 of real turpentine)
It sounds pefectly feasible but not until one gets to real turps and its price.

Somewhere else I have a note of lard oil, soap( which could well have been coconut oil) and water.This was the old factory stuff!

Basicly, you are looking at something which lubricates and cools but at high temperatures.
So Tin mentions 'Castrol' which was castor oil based by C C Wakefield. Castrol R was the stuff that lubricated racing cars and bikes-- and smelled---------------lovely and distinctive.


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## aonemarine (Jan 6, 2013)

look up making diesel from cooking oil on the net. its a matter of heating it and adding lye and methyol alchol then allowing ti to cool and settle. Its been a few years since ive done it and cant really remeber how. I think the process is similar for making lye soap.....


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## kd0afk (Jan 6, 2013)

I heated up a tub of lard to just bellow the smoking point for 30 mins and put it in the fridge. This is what it looks like. Its almost like ice crystals are forming. I haven't touched it. Im thinking of putting it in the freezer to see what happens.


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## kd0afk (Jan 6, 2013)

Here are some photos.


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## goldstar31 (Jan 7, 2013)

If you have ice crystals, you know what will happen to your machinery.

It should be liquid under normal room  temperatures.


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## kd0afk (Jan 7, 2013)

goldstar31 said:


> If you have ice crystals, you know what will happen to your machinery.
> 
> It should be liquid under normal room  temperatures.



I didn't mean that there is ice in it. I meant that it has the appearance of ice or frost.


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## OrangeAlpine (Jan 8, 2013)

goldstar31 said:


> If you have ice crystals, you know what will happen to your machinery.
> 
> It should be liquid under normal room  temperatures.


Where are you located?  Here is the Midwest of the USA, lard is solid at room temperature.  So is palm oil, unless room temp gets up to 80 of so.  So in our house, palm oil is semi-solid in the summer, solid in the winter.  Lard is solid until it hits the skillet.

Bill


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## goldstar31 (Jan 8, 2013)

Situated? Let's try the Roman Wall, or the Cairngorms  in Scotland where if the tops were 40 feet highrer it would be--- Tundra or the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean.

You are talking about Cooking Fat whereas I'm talking about Lard Oil. OIL not something to baste the turkey.

I have just had a male palm tree knocked down in the Balearics- it changed its sex. I know quite a bit about these things. My wife planted it 37 years ago-- in the septic tank- as one does.


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## OrangeAlpine (Jan 8, 2013)

goldstar31 said:


> Situated? Let's try the Roman Wall, or the Cairngorms  in Scotland where if the tops were 40 feet highrer it would be--- Tundra or the Balearic Islands in the Mediterranean.
> 
> You are talking about Cooking Fat whereas I'm talking about Lard Oil. OIL not something to baste the turkey.
> 
> I have just had a male palm tree knocked down in the Balearics- it changed its sex. I know quite a bit about these things. My wife planted it 37 years ago-- in the septic tank- as one does.


But he was talking about lard.

Edit:  after a little time on the Google Machine, I realize he was MAKING lard oil!
Bill


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## goldstar31 (Jan 8, 2013)

OrangeAlpine said:


> But he was talking about lard.
> 
> Edit:  after a little time on the Google Machine, I realize he was MAKING lard oil!
> Bill


 
But he wasn't! He was making lard- not lard oil. Lard, is fat like people have around their middles whilst oil is the stuff that you pour on troubled waters.


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## kd0afk (Jan 8, 2013)

goldstar31 said:


> But he wasn't! He was making lard- not lard oil. Lard, is fat like people have around their middles whilst oil is the stuff that you pour on troubled waters.


Im making lard oil.


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## goldstar31 (Jan 9, 2013)

I'm in Newcastle upon Tyne- home of the great engineers. the time is 10.30AM and the temperature in my unheated workshop is +1C and I have been drilling and tapping mild steel sections for my 6 x 4 bandsaw-- and my lard oil is still sufficiently fluid to use on a paint brush to flow.

It's trivia- but maybe worth a mention.


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## kd0afk (Jan 10, 2013)

I have a little more info. You are supposed to heat the lard to 175F and slowly cool for 3 to 6 days to 10C degrees. But I don't know if you are supposed to cool it so that it reaches 10C at the end of those 6 days or can you cool it slowly till it gets to 10 and keep it there. Now that I think about it it's probably the first thing, cooling at a constant rate to 10 degrees.
Important going to attempt to convert an old fridge to be a cold source to supply chilled brine to a cooling vat and drop the temp 1 degree per hour and see what I get.


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