beeswax / tallow/ crisco
Crisco is primarily vegetable oil based and thus not the same as tallow which is derived from animal fat.
Basically speaking Tallow and lard are the same.
Tallow normally comes from beef and mutton and to some extent venison and even bear.
Lard on the otherhand is from pork.
Both are rendered in much the same way.
The fat from the animal is cooked down til it becomes liquid, impurities strained out, and continued cooking until it becomes a semi solid again.
I'm sure we've all seen the blocks of hog lard in the carton on the shelf in grocery stores. Normal room temps it tends to remain solid.
Like I said this is generally speaking. You can google more info and how to make your own.
Plain crisco as most have experienced will get runny on a warm day and tend to be blown all over the revolver when used as an overball lube.
When blending tallow or lard with beeswax you can eliminate this and make custom blends for different purposes, thinner and thicker as needed.
Once mixed and used and then shot, I haven't noticed any particular odor.
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I primarily use paper cartridges with lubed conicals. Normally no wad and if I do use a wad it is home cut and dry.
From reading I have done, my conclusion of over ball lube was more of a battlefield use than normal day to day.
Back in those days there naturally were copy cat manufacturers of revolvers and round balls, along with the licensed manufacturers.
Some didn't pay as much attention to tolerance details as the brand names did.
Thus some chambers were larger or even smaller than others.
On the battle field it was known many soldiers were collecting spent rounds and moulding new ones in between battles and skirmishes. These moulds weren't always of best quality and sometimes the ball was a little under size.
Combine that with reloading in the heat of battle. Excess powder on face of cylinder and the sometimes forget to put a ball in, is what led to the crossfires. Thus many came up with the overball lube as a battlefield remedy. Rumors spread then as now. So it was more of a preventative safety measure.
With more safety regulations today, better machining tolerances, better steels, there really is no reason for an overball lube if you pay attention.
If you use bulk powder, a proper fitting wad (lubed or dry) not much chance of a spark getting to the powder.
Add in a properly sized ball or conical that shaves a ring all the way around
then there are no airgaps between the chamber walls and the projectiles, thus no way for a spark to reach the powder.
If I wil be out in rainy weather I add a dab of the mixture over and around the nipples after I cap.
Doing this unless I just plain have a dud cap, mine have never failed to go boom.
I've also had dud primers in rifles and revolvers also.
And in 35+ years of shooting BP, I have never had a crossfire.
