Schmoo
Shop slang for grease, grime, sludge or any gooey lubricant, whether doing its job or gumming things up.
A catch-all word for gunk: fresh grease packed into a gearbox, the black paste around an old bearing, way oil mixed with chips or the mystery goo inside a power tool. Tool-teardown culture popularized releasing the schmoo when opening up a housing. Context decides if schmoo is a good sign of lubrication or a bad sign of contamination.
Heard on the job
Crack the gearbox open and let's see the schmoo, if it's gray and gritty the gears have been eating themselves.
Also heard as
- shmoo
- gunk
- goo