What's up everyone? Welcome back to The Durbin Compound! If you haven't met me already, my
name is Devin Durbin. So today on the channel we're going over some mink oil application on
some leather boots. I hope to teach you some tips and tricks along the way. So stay tuned!
All right guys, so what you'll need for this project is, I always have a microfiber towel, of course
your mink oil, depends on what kind of brand you get. I've always had the Ariat or the Griffin mink
oil. They've all been good to me. And I also throw in some leather gloves. So, usually I only put a
leather glove? a latex glove. So I usually only put on a latex glove on one hand, the hand that I'm applying
with. Just makes it that much easier for cleanup. So, I'm going to bring you in close here. I'm going to shift the
light so that you guys can see this application and just exactly what I do. Okay guys, let's get
down to it. So this is pretty straightforward. Anytime you apply mink oil I'm going to warn
you, if you're looking into it. It will make the leather a lot darker. So just keep that in mind
when you're thinking about mink oil on a fresh set of boots. It is going to make the leather a
lot darker. So literally, you just take your paste here. If it's warm inside the house, you'll get a nice
easy application there on your fingers. And we're literally just going to rub it into the leather. So
I'm going to make a couple talking points while I'm doing this. I always concentrate on my seams.
Usually most of the time when people talk about boots wearing out it's, always along the seams
first. And what happens is you get moisture, you get dirt, and it basically breaks down the threads
in between the leather sections. So a lot of people will say, "Oh, these boots only lasted
me a year blah blah blah blah." Well they didn't take care of them. They let moisture rot out the
threads. And then they come apart on them. So that's the first place you're going to have water intrusion
in a leather boot. Your mink oil keeps that leather supple and definitely allows it to keep its, you
know, water repellent properties. So this mink oil you can already see how dark it makes the
the leather. I'm a big fan of it. Some people aren't. Some people want to keep that light leather look.
Now the mink oil will keep it impervious to a lot of things. So I even had recently...this exact pair of
boots I was wearing, during a paint mixing event, where I was mixing a five-gallon bucket of epoxy
paint--white. And literally the bucket spun around on me. And literally covered these boots in white
epoxy paint. So you can't even tell that these were even in a paint accident, where they were literally
covered. I didn't get them to the point where I could clean them off for about 20 minutes. So the fact
that...see? This is some aluminized paint right here that was on there before. But you can't
even really tell where I had literally covered these things in white paint. It was able to be
cleaned off. I used some citrus-based cleaner and it literally allowed me to wash it right off of
the leather. So that's the awesome thing about mink oil is, when you're doing your boots like
this, you keep up with it often, to keep your boots in good shape. Keep the leather pliable. Keep the
water and all the crap out of it. And it all around just takes care of your boot from the outside in.
You know, if you've watched any of my previous boot videos, I'm a big proponent of
boot drying. You definitely need to take care of your boots day in and day out. If you want some
longevity out of them, you need to dry them. And a boot dryer is the best way to do it. So keeps the
stitching and stuff from rotting from the inside. This will definitely protect them from the outside.
So these boots are about three years old. They're well worn. I'm about to get them resoled. You can
see the soles on them. They're just getting worn down. So, after you've coated the boot completely,
the directions on all mink oil I've seen always say wait five minutes. So we're going to set this
off to the side. We're going to do the other boot. And then, by the time we're done doing the other boot, it'll probably
be about five minutes. And all we're going to do is literally, just wipe it off with the microfiber. So...
All right guys so, as I start to wipe this boot off, it's been about five minutes.
You don't want to overly work the microfiber. You're literally just wiping off the
excess. So just be careful to wipe, you know, around the seams and things like that. Just get
the gunk off here. As you wear the boot the rest of it will come off. Not necessarily need to be
going crazy with the microfiber. Just wipe off the excess. So a couple things that I wanted to put in
here also with this video is that I do this every couple weeks. Maybe every three weeks, or four weeks,
whenever I see the leather start to get the color that I started with. You know, that's when I do it.
You see how it turned the leather a nice darker color and it's very, very pliable. So then
it makes it very, very comfortable to wear every day. And I attribute the reason why my boots last
so long is because I take care of them. So, don't think that you can just throw a boot on your foot
every day and it's going to last an eternity. Some of them are good. Some of them are bad, but it also
depends a lot on you. So, we're going to go ahead and clean the other boot off and wrap up this video.
All right guys, I hope that brought some value to you and your boots. Applying mink oil is the simple
process. Take the time to take care of your boots. They will take care of you. I've worn the crap out
of these boots. And every time I use mink oil and refresh them people are like, "Man did you get new
boots?" No, I just take care of the boots that I wear in, day in and day out. So keep that in mind.
Always take care of your stuff. It'll take care of you. So I hope you guys enjoyed the video. Give
me a thumbs up, or a thumbs down. Whatever you're into! And we'll see you guys in the next video.