I don't know a lot about whaling but what I know, this guy gets wrong. Whale oil burns bright white, without smoke, without odor. SOURCE: old-timers in the watch industry with stocks of fucking whale oil. I've seen photos, have not seen burning whale oil, but we're talking the difference between "daylight balanced" and "cool white." Actually the heavy guys don't really give a fuck. Watch guys, on the other hand, regret the demise of Nye's Dolphin Head Oil and not just because Moebius is expensive. Haven't burned it, but it has no smell. Margarine is a beef byproduct. However, due to a lack of labeling laws it often ended up being a "whatever disgusting gack you had sitting around" product. The whole point of margarine is it was dumbly cheaper than butter, and if you make it from whale oil it most assuredly isn't. Much faster to get through than the book.ts primary historical use was as a fuel source for lamp lights since it emitted a fairly bright yellow glow at the expense of an unpleasant though not overwhelming odor.
Whale oil’s second major historical use was as a lubricant, particularly for heavy industrial machinery.
Whale oil’s third major historical usage was as a key ingredient in margarine.
That's why ya read about it! 1. The article discusses two different types of whale oil, regular low quality stuff, and a specific type from Sperm Whales known as Spermaceti Oil which is more similar to what you're thinking about. Per the article posted: And that stuff is 2-3x price of regular whale oil. 2. Again, the article describes that the spermaceti oil is good for lubricant on watches and stuff, but regular whale oil was used for heavy industrial lubricant due to being cheap and good. In fact, whale oil was even used in car transmissions into the 70s, and per the article posted, whale oil use was banned in '73, and from '72 to '75, transmission failure went from 1 million to 8 million. 3. Margarine is a beef product, in the United States. Whale oil was mostly used in margarine in Europe, where cow access was much worse in the late 1800s and early 1900sI don't know a lot about whaling
Spermaceti oil was most commonly used for lighting, either as candles or refined to a more oily form for lamps. It was considered the highest quality light of its day, emitting a bright white flame with no smell, and it was uniquely resistant to freezing in extremely low temperatures.
More importantly, there was no American domestic demand for whale oil because there was no American domestic demand for margarine. America always had plenty of cows and plenty of butter, and no need for an inferior substitute.
There was differentiation between "whale oil" and "spermacetti" among the crusty old folx I've spoken with. Even whale oil was better than candles by a fair sight. And if you read through the links on the transmission fluid, the whale oil was an additive that prevented corrosion. ATF of the era was shitty. So were American cars. The Japanese didn't lean as heavily into automatic trannys at the time so they had no ATF coolers. And not to put too fine a point on it, but you're putting my first- and second-hand knowledge up against some rando on the internet, collecting the information of other randos on the internet. I will get Dave to send me a shot of his bottle of Nye's.