# Getting steric acid to melt



## Sexymess (May 4, 2017)

I searched before I posted this. I tryed adding steric acid to my soap. I put it in with the hot lye water. It didn't melt. I had to strain it out. I have tryed one more time to melt it with my oils and again it didn't melt and I had to strain it out. I ordered the wrong stuff. I wanted sodium lactate. I have read steric acid can be irritating to some people's skin. Definaltly not what my family needs. I am trying to cut down on coconut oil for hardness. And go with a vegan recipe with less coconut oil. But I can't get this stuff to melt. Should I melt it by its self? Should I just forget it and order the sodium lactate? I hate to waste anything.


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## DeeAnna (May 4, 2017)

The solution is pretty simple. You have to get the temp to just under 160 F for stearic to melt. And the stearic has to stay at that temp long enough to get the entire job of melting done, which is why your hot lye didn't work. You can melt it by itself or with other oils, whatever works best for you.


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## toxikon (May 4, 2017)

Stearic acid does have a higher melt point than most of your other ingredients! When I use it at 50% to make a shaving soap it took a loooong time to melt in the crockpot on high.

Are you saying you added it solid to your lye water, separate from your oils? As far as I know, stearic acid should be treated as an oil and melted in with all the rest of your oils, then combined with your lye solution.


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## Nao (May 4, 2017)

Sodium lactat and stearic acid isn't  really interchangeable or remotely the same thing. And I'm not sure sodium lactat will solve your problems. What about reformulating and adding palm or butters to up the hardness?


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## IrishLass (May 4, 2017)

I only use stearic acid in my shave soap (which I HP). I pre-melt it all by itself in a separate stainless bowl the oven set to 250F (which typically takes about 40 minutes to melt for me at that temp). Once melted, I turn the oven down to 200F and leave it there while I bring the rest of my fats up to about 180F on the stovetop before adding it in. 


IrishLass


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## Sexymess (May 4, 2017)

I wanted something
To help harden my bars. Without using coconut oil or the more expensive butters. I just ordered the wrong thing. I read that steric acid can harden bars as well. 
Also,  it was so cheap it would cost me money to return it so I figured I would try to use it. Maybe I can sell it somehow? Sigh


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## Sexymess (May 4, 2017)

Nao said:


> Sodium lactat and stearic acid isn't  really interchangeable or remotely the same thing. And I'm not sure sodium lactat will solve your problems. What about reformulating and adding palm or butters to up the hardness?



Iam trying to soap palm free. So far I haven't used any. I have found two places here that sell  sustainable palm. So I could get some. I wanted to try I few different things out first.


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## Nao (May 4, 2017)

Right. I have made one soap with 5% and one with 10% stearic acid without problem, as the others have mentioned the key is heat. I messed up one 10% stearic acid soap because I was soaping to cold too. What I usually do is completely melting the stearic acid first then "dilute" it with my hard oils, then adding the soft oils after the hard oils have melted too. 

So you could experiment to see how high you could go before the soap starting to become waxy or whatever happens with too much stearic acid. 

Also have you tried adding salt? 

That's about what I can think of to harden up your bars. I think sustainable Palm would be a really good option if nothing else works.


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## madison (May 4, 2017)

Sexymess said:


> I searched before I posted this. I tryed adding steric acid to my soap. I put it in with the hot lye water. It didn't melt. I had to strain it out. I have tryed one more time to melt it with my oils and again it didn't melt and I had to strain it out. I ordered the wrong stuff. I wanted sodium lactate. I have read steric acid can be irritating to some people's skin. Definaltly not what my family needs. I am trying to cut down on coconut oil for hardness. And go with a vegan recipe with less coconut oil. But I can't get this stuff to melt. Should I melt it by its self? Should I just forget it and order the sodium lactate? I hate to waste anything.


 
I remember reading some old threads here that stearic acid is not something soap makers prefer to use to harden their soap, I don't find the original posts though.


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## toxikon (May 4, 2017)

Maybe if you give us a list of affordable and accessible oils in your country we can help you formulate a good recipe!


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## toxikon (May 4, 2017)

Also, sodium lactate helps make unmolding easier but doesn't really have a huge effect on overall bar hardness.


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## kchaystack (May 4, 2017)

Sexymess said:


> Iam trying to soap palm free. So far I haven't used any. I have found two places here that sell  sustainable palm. So I could get some. I wanted to try I few different things out first.



Well you probably don't want to use stearic acid.  Most of it is made from palm oil.


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## Sexymess (May 4, 2017)

toxikon said:


> Maybe if you give us a list of affordable and accessible oils in your country we can help you formulate a good recipe!



Olive oil
Castor oil
Canola ( rApeseed) oil
Avacado oil
Lard- which I use in my non vegan recipes
Coconut oil virgin and deodorized
Soya oil
We also have crisco the new one with palm, but Iam not sure where or how they get it. 
I use in small amounts cocoa butter and Shea butter never more than 5 % depending on total weight of recipe. 
Beeswax 
These are all the ones I can get with out having to order  
My very first recipe was

Castor 5%
Coconut oil 15 %
Olive oil 7.5 %
Canola oil 7.5%
Lard 60 or 65 % 
Sf 5%
This is a great recipe. Nice hard bars. I love it. My family loves it. I have made 100% lard bars. They rock. The problem with the above recipe is it is too cleansing 11, should I superfat higher? I use homemade bodybutter or lotion bars after every bath. Even the bars I made with 22 cleansing don't bother my skin. It must be the butter after. Anyhoo... I made a vegan coconut oil olive castor and it's called Bastille recipe it has a cleansing of 17! Should I sf at 8? Or even 10. Will that effect the hardness of the bar? 
.


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## psfred (May 5, 2017)

I hope this isn't repeating too much, but stearic acid can be hard to handle.  It will dissolve in the other oils above 150F or so, but if you allow the oils to cool very much, can cause a false trace by precipitating out if the temperature drops very much.  It will also saponify pretty much instantly with lye, which will give you a very thick trace of only the stearic acid, not the other oils.

I don't have much experience here, but my guess is above 10% stearic you are going to be much happier with hot process.  There is considerable risk that cold process will result in stearic acid spots unless you keep the temp above 150 long enough for it to completely saponify.  Certainly shaving soaps with high pure stearic acid levels require hot processing, if you try cold process you get mashed potatoes as soon as you pour in the lye!

The stearic acid will only "melt" in your lye if it's very hot, and if it does, it will become instant soap.

If you have access to it, pure soy wax (fully hydrogenated soy oil) contains about 87% stearic acid, and behaves much better than the pure isolated free stearic acid.  

As for your recipe, again I don't have much experience, but if your family likes it, it's fine.  The numbers for hardness and cleansing in soap calculators are really just an index of the fatty acid salts in the finished soap to allow you to compare them to others you've made.  If you don't find the soap drying, it's fine, and a soap recipe with similar number should feel much the same to you.   Changing the percent superfat will NOT change the numbers, just the way your skin feels after you rinse the soap off.  More than 8% may leave you with greasy feeling soap that does not clean well, but suit yourself.

I don't think I've every had dry skin in my life (quite the opposite) so I don't find much soap to be drying, but everyone's skin is different.   I will be experimenting with superfat levels for bath soaps -- I use 5% for shaving soap and it's fine.


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## Sexymess (May 5, 2017)

Thank you. I may try shaving soap one day.


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