Baby oil for sharpening...yes or no

upnorth

upnorth

Joined
Nov 25, 2006
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I did a search on sharpening oil and found members using: WD-40/diluted dish soap/Kerosene/olive oil/light mineral oil/baby oil/standard engine oil/water/dry etc. I'm a little skeptical about some of these lubes/non-lubes but I did find the baby oil interesting as a readily available, cheap alternative to the half full bottle in my big Lansky kit. Would you use baby oil? Yes or no. Thanks.

Isn't baby oil a light mineral oil?
 
I don't like the smell of baby oil:barf: Save a baby use transmission fluid instead..:D
 
Baby Oil is fine (pure, not aloed, vitamined, w/e)
better to get mineral oil that is sold as a laxative
 
GarageBoy is right, just get a big jug of mineral oil from the drugstore. And I have heard (never bothered to actually check a bottle of the stuff) that standard baby oil is indeed simply mineral oil with scent added.
 
Yes, baby oil is simply mineral oil with scent, not pressed baby. It'll work fine, if you can deal with the smell.

I don't use oil, and usually don't even use any lubricant. When I do, it's simply water.
 
Good stuff made better cutting it 2:1 or 3:1 with kerosene. Oil floats the swarf, kerosene lubricates and increases cutting effieciency.

NJ
 
Now that I use diamond hones rather than stone, the only lube I use is either a bit of kero, or water, or most often, nothing.
Greg
 
Dude, lube is lube...

Or you could try going lubeless. I gave it up a while back and haven't looked back...

Quicker, cleaner, and more efficient job. Keener edge with the same grit...
 
I don't use any lube for sharpening. I do use the food grade mineral oil for protection on high caron kitchen knives.

Let's see what exposure in the Maintenence forum gets us ... moving ...
 
I use mineral oil cut with a little mineral spirits; floats the slur off a little better.:thumbup:
 
I may carry and sharpen my own knife, but I still love the smell of a baby.

I mean, c'mon, what's not to like about the smell of a baby, or who's secure enough to admit it? That'd be like saying you don't like the smell of a girl's hair, or the smell of napalm in the morning. It's just not right.
 
Baby oil is mineral oil with scent.

I got a pt jug of thread cutting lubricant at Home Depot a couple of years ago for a couble of bucks. Still using it with my Norton combo stone. Cost of the fluid should not be an issue unless you do this professionally every day all day long.
 
Automatic transmission fluid is a very good cleaner, and NOT a very good "lubricant". You want cleaning, but you DON'T want lubrication on your stone.

I can't prove this, but I strongly suspect that Buck honing oil is nothing more than ATF.

And it works like gangbusters!:p
 
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