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Old 27th November 2007, 06:40 AM   #4
A. G. Maisey
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Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 6,746
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This oiling question has come up a few times in the past, I think.

The "right" way to oil probably depends upon what your objective is.

If your only consideration is blade preservation, then the first thing you must do is never store your blades in the wrongkos.
Ferric material should not be in contact with cellulose material if you want to avoid rust. The ideal would be to store the blade bare, supported on glass or plastic, controlled temperature and humidity, protected from dust, oiled with a good quality gun oil manufactured specifically for long-term storage of firearms.

That's the ideal, and not many people would be prepared to go that far. I'm not.

On the other hand, if you want to oil to maintain a little bit of tradition, you oil with a fragrant oil mixed with mineral oil (liquid parrafin).

My personal approach is to drench with WD40 and let it dry off overnight, then my keris oil ( recipe elsewhere in the Warung), then I wrap the blade in a plastic sleeve and replace it in the wrongko. The plastic sleeve prevents the oil drying out, and prevents ugly stains on the wrongko. The blade will usually not go back all the way into the wrongko when its wrapped in plastic, but if you store your keris in singap and keep them in a protected place, that does not matter.I have kept keris in this way for years without re-oiling.

If you want to keep your keris on constant display it may be best to make it a weekly job to lightly oil the blade, making sure that there is not an excess of oil that can run down the blade and drop onto the floor or whatever may be under the keris. At the same time dust and polish the wrongko. Keris left on constant display can get dirty very easily, and the finish will deteriorate much more quickly than if they are stored sympathetically.

What you use for oil, how often you oil, and how you store your keris depends entirely on what your objectives are.
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