I think the transmission stuff was sperm oil, wax from head of a sperm whale. Which probably accounts for some of the confusion here. There were several differe

I think the transmission stuff was sperm oil, wax from head of a sperm whale. Which probably accounts for some of the confusion here. There were several different products derived from whales, if you're not aware of that you wouldn't expect to find sperm whale dome grease in a blue whale's bones. The nomenclature isn't that clear, and none of us have first hand experience with any of them anymore so all of our knowledge about this is from third hand reddit TILs and moby dick.