Hi, does anyone have any experience with recipes like this that contain synthetics/petroleum derivatives? Ever since I ruined a good pair of shoes with kiwi shoe polish back in grade school I've always loathed all synthetics/petroleum derivatives. But now I'm starting to think otherwise.
The reason I started using tallow - and stumbled on this thread - in the first place is because pretty much ALL other oils/fats go rancid. From an oxidation point of view, motor oil & kerosene are hard to beat as they're basically rancid-proof. This makes them the best oils to soften tallow with, as opposed to other natural oils.
For the record I've experimented with chicken oil, boiled linseed oil, linseed oil, castor oil, any vegetable cooking oil from the kitchen, etc. Either applied directly, or incorporated into shoe creme (admittedly, it's kiwi shoe creme but hey at least it looked buttery white not like the coal tar leather destroyer from hell) All to no satisfaction at all.
(looking back I now recoil at the sadistic experiments I did on my school shoes but well, all in the name of science!)
Tallow has been a lifesaver but I'm getting tired of the hair drier routine. Please share whatever you know or have heard about synthetics/petroleum derivatives. And if petroleum products like mineral oil or petrolatum do turn out to be suitable for leather, can someone explain why kiwi shoe polish which reeks of paraffin turned my shoes into a drought-blasted cracked-mud picture of desolation?