# bubbly soap recipe



## phpworm (Oct 26, 2009)

I'm trying to come up with or find a recipe that has a crazy amount of bubbles, but is still low on the cleansing side (preferably 14 or lower) as this is for dry sensitive skin. The oils I have to work with are olive, coconut, castor, palm, palm kernel, shea butter, and soybean.

The main thing is that I want as many bubbles as possible. I've read that adding sugar helps, but I would like an already bubbly recipe to start with to see if I can't get even more with the added sugar.

Any ideas?


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## dagmar88 (Oct 26, 2009)

Well, just play around on soapcalc.net a bit.
Normally, when you keep your 'bubbly oil' (like coconut and pko) under 30, it won't be too hard on the skin. Especially in combo with higher levels of olive. Be sure to ad some 5-8% of castor to aid your bubbles.
Good luck!


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## carebear (Oct 26, 2009)

and keep in mind that a more generous superfat/lye discount can counter the coconut's drying thing.


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## phpworm (Oct 26, 2009)

Thanks. I was playing around with the calc the other night but having trouble getting the right numbers I'm after. I was hoping someone might have an existing "super bubble recipe" that has proven to work, which I could borrow from..

I'll keep trying!


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## holly99 (Oct 26, 2009)

I just sit around playing with SoapCalc a lot. Like now I'm watching Bonnie Hunt (waiting for The Pioneer Woman to be on!) and I just punch stuff in. I can't say that it's been overly successful but it is fun when you aren't pressed for time and can play around with it.

So far, I've found that to bring up the bubbly oils, my cleansing factor goes up too. Butters and higher superfat brings the lather back down to more lotion-like. Same with milks. I've tried doing a high coconut oil bar but it was just too harsh even with the high superfat. (I know a good bar can be made this way though, but mine wasn't).

So keep playing and let us know if you come up with something!  I'll let you know if I do too.


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## MikeInPdx (Oct 26, 2009)

phpworm said:
			
		

> Thanks. I was playing around with the calc the other night but having trouble getting the right numbers I'm after. I was hoping someone might have an existing "super bubble recipe" that has proven to work, which I could borrow from..
> 
> I'll keep trying!



Here's one to plug in to soap calc and see if you like the numbers.....try this on for size as a starting point and play from there! 

Palm 35%
Olive 30%
Coconut (76 deg, solid) 20%
Soybean Oil 10% 
Castor Oil 5% 

Here are the numbers for that recipe...

Hardness  39 
Cleansing 14 
Conditioning 57 
Bubbly 18 
Creamy 30 
Iodine 63 
INS 146 

Have fun.....just don't go much above 10% on the castor or you run the risk of a sticky soap.


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## honor435 (Oct 26, 2009)

i tried coming up with something, but that cleansing number is too low for high bubbles, does that make sense? ive made some really nice moisturizing soap with cleansing number at 20-22. Usually pko and coc and oo and castor makes a nice bubbly soap, with a little shea very nice.
heres one
oo 12
co 9
po 4
shea 4
castor 3 oz    10.5 water 4.4 lye      hard  40
                                                    cleansing  19
                                                    cond 56
                                                     bubbles 27
                                                     creamy 29
or co 5
oo 11
po 5
pk 5
shea 4
castor 3         10.8 water  4.5 lye      41, 20,55, 28, 29
so, you can do high bubbles, but the cleansing number goes up.


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## Christianbeauty (Oct 26, 2009)

So I am not sure completley about percentages....i speak in terms of oz.

I just made a soap tonight --still pretty amateur to hot processing...
So ultra bubbles for a small 2 lb batch of soap...you can play with the ounces as others mentioned
*
I used:*
Olive oil - 16 oz
Coconut Oil - 12 oz
Palm - 8.4 oz
Then:
Lye - 4.8 oz
Coconut Milk/Water - 10.7 oz


I believe that the coconut milk aided in the production of a rich lather with a high intense bubble factor paired with that coconut oil! It was a soft soap--it was orange from the unrefined palm oil


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## dagmar88 (Oct 27, 2009)

Hi Christianbeauty, you can easily covert your oz to percentages when using soapcalc.net. Just fill in all of your oils in oz, press calculate recipe and it will instantly show the %.


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## phpworm (Nov 1, 2009)

I came up with a recipe and gave it a try with the following numbers,

hardness: 29
cleansing: 14
conditioning: 67
bubbly: 59 (woo!)
creamy: 60
iodine: 62
ins: 136

Just cut it up and doesn't look bad. Has a green apple/menthol smell to it. I used a 25% water discount to harden it up and also added sugar for that extra bubble. Will need to let it sit for a couple weeks before I'm ready to test it out but when I do I'll let you know and maybe add some pictures if it works.


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## holly99 (Nov 1, 2009)

Wowza, how did you get such a high bubble number with a low cleansing number?


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## honor435 (Nov 1, 2009)

really, what is it? the highest bubbles ive ever done is 30 and that made my cleansing 20. tell us, pleasssse.


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## holly99 (Nov 1, 2009)

honor435 said:
			
		

> really, what is it? the highest bubbles ive ever done is 30 and that made my cleansing 20. tell us, pleasssse.



Yeah, that's the best I've gotten too.


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## Ollieblue (Nov 1, 2009)

..........


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## phpworm (Nov 1, 2009)

Yeah, I used a lot of castor. With the water discount and the preparation (I added my lye to the castor first) I'm hoping to avoid the "sticky" issue.


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## honor435 (Nov 1, 2009)

i dont know if thats going to be good soap, i can give you a recipe with 30 for bubbly, it is creamy and bubbly and not slimy, let me know.


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## ohsoap (Nov 1, 2009)

Since we are talking about bubbly soaps, I have a question...
I can never seem to get my bubbly past 23 or my cleansing below 19, my soaps are always very creamy though, which I love.  However one of my girlfriends said that "the soap was nice, but did have a lot of bubbles." 
Will adding sugar make a noticable difference, or should I be considering a new formula?
Can my soap still be creamy?  AND bubbly?  I seem to either have one or the other.


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## holly99 (Nov 1, 2009)

I found a recipe that is a happy balance between bubbly and creamy. 
The bubbly is only 26 but it starts with big, poofy bubbles and then calms to soft, foamy bubbles and for me it feels like I'm washing with bubbly lotion. So for me it is perfect. But it does seem that the kind of water you have, soft or hard, makes a big difference on bubbles and such. So for my water, it's the perfect combo.

My recipe uses olive, palm, coconut, castor, mango butter, and avocado. 
I haven't really tried working PKO in there yet but I know it ups the bubbly. 

Hardness 41
Cleansing 17
Condition  56
Bubbly 26
Creamy 33
Iodine 56
INS 155

ETA: I do add sugar and salt to my lye water but I've not tried the recipe without them so don't really know the difference.


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## artisan soaps (Nov 1, 2009)

..


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## phpworm (Nov 2, 2009)

> Please share your recipe in % amounts so we may try it too ..


castor oil (50%)
palm oil (25%)
palm kernel oil (11%)
coconut oil (11%)
olive oil (3%)


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## whisks (Nov 2, 2009)

wow, that's masses of castor - almost like the OO and castor swapped places! with so much castor, doesn't the soap come out soft?


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## phpworm (Nov 2, 2009)

Like I said, I used a 25% water discount and added the lye to the castor first. It thickened up pretty quick and was hard enough to cut in less than 24 hours. I'm gonna give it until the end of this week and then see how well it bubbles up.


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## holly99 (Nov 2, 2009)

Well, it's worth a try! I love to experiment!


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## artisan soaps (Nov 2, 2009)

..


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## Ollieblue (Nov 2, 2009)

.........


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## honor435 (Nov 2, 2009)

holly
i have many recipes that have good bubbly and creamy, i do use pk alot though.
heres one       
9.5 oo           hardness 43 cleans/20, cond/52, bubbly/29, creamy 32
co 9.5 oz
po 9.5
castor 3


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## phpworm (Nov 3, 2009)

Okay I couldn't wait until the end of the week.. Here is a video of the first hand wash (with my slightly deformed end piece), so you can judge for yourself. These are my wifes hands because she says I can't make bubbles right.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oZl40wx6VM[/ame]

In her opinion it bubbles up quite nicely, it's not slimy, has good moisture, and is a little sticky when wet but not anymore than an average bar of soap.

After a quick shower from my point of view: the bar felt a little slimy in my hands. For whatever reason I couldn't get it to bubble up on my body very much (my wife was right) but it had a nice lather to it, and it felt just a little dry rubbing it against my skin which could have been the oatmeal. I put menthol in this soap too so I'm experiencing a nice cooling sensation.

Over all it's a nice solid bar, wonderful smell of green apple and menthol, and after the first impression - considering it will only get better with age - I think I'll definitely be using this recipe again.


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## honor435 (Nov 3, 2009)

didnt you just make this? i hope it was hp, or its not ready, it will get better with time, lots of time with all that castor, try some other recipes, you WILL like them, that much castor will be spendy?


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## phpworm (Nov 3, 2009)

Yeah I just made it 4 days ago.. CP. It passed the zap test.


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## holly99 (Nov 3, 2009)

It's kind of funny, I've been keeping up on this thread and hadn't heard of using large amounts of castor before. Then I got a new book called "Soap and Other Obsessions" and they use 25% castor in many of their recipes. 

It will be interesting to see how it cures out.


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## artisan soaps (Nov 3, 2009)

..


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## carebear (Nov 3, 2009)

phpworm said:
			
		

> Yeah I just made it 4 days ago.. CP. It passed the zap test.



good, that means it's safe - but it'll get milder and the lather will improve over the next 4 weeks.  so set a bar where it'll be nice and dry for that period and try it then!


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## holly99 (Nov 3, 2009)

artisan soaps said:
			
		

> holly99 said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I really haven't looked it through completely but I'm just ok with it right now. I thought I'd read that it had lots of beautiful pictures but it's just black and white. I'll have to flip through it more to really form a good opinion on it.


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## phpworm (Nov 4, 2009)

I have the book and love it.. Being new to soaping it has really helped me get a good grasp on things and the authors have been extremely helpful answering my questions via e-mail.

It covers a lot more than soaping though, which I don't really have an interest in right now. There are a few color pictures in the back of the book but that's it.


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