oil for keris

[A. G. Maisey]

Actually, I am quite certain that if all we want is metal protection a good quality gun oil will provide far better protection than my home brew keris oil.

I've got about a dozen firearms, and I do not use fragrant oil on them, I use Hoppe's.

However, I live 25 meters from a salt water lake, my house is continually exposed to driving southerly winds, the verandah poles on the front of my house rust out in about 8 or 10 years and need repeated replacement. But the keris & etc that I have used my own oil on do not ever rust, and some of those keris have not been touched in more than ten years.

It goes without saying that I do not store my keris against cellulose material. Wood is a cellulose material. Nobody who has any respect at all for a steel blade should store that blade in such a way that it is in contact with cellulose material. Apart from which, storing an oiled blade in a wooden scabbard is a sure and certain way to stain the wood and eventually damage that wood and the value of the scabbard.

Nor do I display my kerises. I used to, but I found that over time, even with continual dusting, polishing, oiling and waxing, the dress of items I had on display gradually deteriorated. So I took a page out of the Javanese book and began storing my keris in cloth covers and then in chests of drawers.

I am also very committed to the use of plastic sleeves placed over blades.

Just on the off-chance that there might be some sort of something that has made its home in one of my keris, I am sure that it prefers the fragrance of my home brew keris oil to the cutting stink of gun oil. At least, none of those somethings has ever wandered away from its comfortable little home in its keris of choice, and caused me any problems.