# 92* vs 76* coconut oil?



## mamaT (Sep 16, 2009)

Are there any advantages to using one over the other?  I need to order some more coconut oil and there is only a dollar difference in price for 50#.


----------



## Saltysteele (Sep 16, 2009)

this is the answer i found:



> 92 degree coconut oil is hydrogenated, a process which turns it into a solid that has a melting point of 92 degrees. Coconut Oil for Soap Making 92 degree coconut oil is believed to make a harder, less lathering bar than 76 degree oil.
> 76 degree coconut oil is unrefined and the most common type of oil used in soaps.
> Fractionated coconut oil is oil that has been refined so only part of the oil remains. This process gives it a long shelf life. This oil is better for massage oils and hand lotions then for making soap


----------



## mamaT (Sep 16, 2009)

Thanks for the info.  I guess I'll just get what I got before, the 76* coconut oil.


----------



## Janine (Apr 23, 2018)

how do you no if its 72 degrees


----------



## BattleGnome (Apr 23, 2018)

76* coconut oil is the standard. The oil is processed to remove certain fatty acids to get the 92* or fractionated varieties. Unless it specifically says what temperature the oil melts at, I think it would be safe to assume you have the 76*


----------



## Janine (Apr 23, 2018)

yes thankyou


----------



## Zany_in_CO (Jul 8, 2018)

92° is a good choice for body butters, lotion bars, lip balms, etc. that you don't want to melt when its so hot out, i.e., some farmers markets in the summer time.

I've never understood why anyone would use fractionated coconut oil in soap.  ???   I love it in lotions and potions tho. Has a very long shelf life and has a silky elegance feel on the skin when combined with other skin-loving oils.


----------



## soapmaker (Jul 8, 2018)

I was going to post this in the lotion forum but here is the coconut oil breakdown so I will post it here. Why is fractionated coconut oil called a "drying oil?"


----------



## Rune (Jul 10, 2018)

I think it is because fractionated coconut oil contains almost only the short chained capric (10-carbon) and caprylic acids (8-carbon), that are said to be drying to the skin (I have read DeeAnna mention those two as the reason for the drying qualities of coconut oil. And the fractionated variety have much more of them. Way more. And also).

Soapee shows more fatty acids than SoapCalc, so you can see the difference between regular coconut oil 76 degree and fractionated coconut there.

But I will migrate over to this german calculator; http://www.handmade-by-kathrin.de/soap/calc/
After trying it a little bit, I find it better than SoapCalc. But also confusing when you don't live in USA (SoapCalc) or Germany, and don't have the standard goods the soap calculators use. I bought coconut oil today. And I have no idea what kind it is, for example. I know that it is not virgin, not fractionated and probably not 92 degrees. I suspect it might be the same as Palmin (a product we don't have here, but it is listed on the german calculator. Google said it is used for Kalter Hund (cold dog), which is a cake that is exactly the same as our Delfiakake (Delfia cake). And my coconut have the name Delfiafett, because it is for Delfiakake. And Delfiafett is not to be found on any soap calculator, for sure. So, a lot of guessing. I just hope the soap I will make tomorrow, of 6-7 oils (4 of them unknown) will turn out great. The only oils I know for sure is the castor and the high oleic sunflower (and also the olive, if I choose to use that too. But it has expired, so I don't know if it is safe to use or not. I don't want rancid soap, especially if I succeed in making a fabulous soap, for once  ).


----------



## soapmaker (Jul 10, 2018)

Thanks, Rune, it's just hard for me to imagine oil being drying. But I know from experience it is more drying than olive. Could you use only the oils you know what are to make your soap? I would hate to make a soap with 4 unknown oils. You could hardly expect it to turn out great. Good luck!


----------



## Rune (Jul 11, 2018)

I'm not any experienced or anything. But they say the reason for some oils being drying, is because they are turned into soap, and change completely from what they were to begin with. I don't thing either that any oil is drying when they are used as oils. But as soap, fractionated coconut oil, an oil that is not drying at all, will change to be drying.

Yes, the unknown fats are a struggle. But I think it will be okey. I have no choice other than to use them. The alternative is to make castile soap only.

I tried to figure out more about my coconut oil. The only coconut oil available here (unless I visit an immigrant shop). So I read the label. And it was not pure coconut oil, as I thought, no. It has an emulgator added (sunflower lecithin). There is not water in the oil or anything. But the coconut oil is for special use, so it should be melted, cooled off and then added to the cake batter (egg mixture). So the emulgator must be to blend the oil well in the cake batter, or something. The problem is that I have no idea if this emulgator will mess up my cold process soap. I have used the coconut oil before, but that was in hot process. I don't think I have used it in cold process before, but are not sure.

So I guess it is very needed to actually read the labels. I never did because on the front, it says "Coconut Foodfat" (direct translation). And on the back, it says "Coconut Fat. Weight: 250g" with bold letters. But the ingredients say "Fully hardened coconut oil, emulgator (sunflower lecithin)".

Well, well, I have two packages of it now, and have to use it. I guess it will not mess up too much, since it is used in Norway to make soap. It is quite expensive as well.

I found something interesting I will order, if the crappy company will answer their mails. I found stearin in 5kg bags for quite a low price. And it is both food grade and cosmetic safe (I found in the MSDS). It has 44-49% palmitic acid and 50-56% stearic acid. So I have found this stearin for sale, but I found it cheaper and with free shipping from another company. They have the same title and the same images as the first one. So I mailed them to get it confirmed that their stearin is called Palmac 50-18, or if they could send me a MSDS. If they don't answer I will have to order the more expensive one, which I know for sure is cosmetic safe. I have also found the sap value for that stearin. I want some stearin to make it possible to use more soft oils. Hard oils are really the problem to find here, and it is expensive. Palm oil is non-existing in grocery stores, for example. Cocoa and mango butter can't be found anywhere. But we have cheap olive oil, high oleic sunflower and regular sunflower, rapeseed and high oleic rapeseed. The rapeseed oil are like really, really cheap (almost for free). I hope to make a good soap by using some cheap soft oils, a little bit of coconut and a little bit of castor oil plus that stearin with stearic and palmitic to harden it up and make it longer lasting and more creamy.

But it will be no soapmaking today. It have to be another day. Too little sleep. Strong coffee and Youtube, that is more what I feel to do right now


----------



## Zany_in_CO (Jul 11, 2018)

Rune said:


> I hope to make a good soap by using some cheap soft oils, a little bit of coconut and a little bit of castor oil plus that stearin with stearic and palmitic to harden it up and make it longer lasting and more creamy.


I'm impressed, Rune, at how you are working through the problem of finding soaping oils in Norway. It seems to me you are on the right track, but I'm not familiar with coconut fat that contains lecithin or how that might effect the final result. When I translated "Delfiafett" from Norwegian to English the result was "grease, fat". Since it is used in making cake, I imagine it's more like "shortening", which we also use in baked goods here. There is vegetable shortening like Crisco and animal fat shortening like lard -- which makes yummy pie crust, BTW. I'm just hoping all the best for you... Good luck!


----------



## Rune (Jul 12, 2018)

Hihi, yes, well, what do do when we have a lot of small grocery stores with few goods insted of some bigger one with everything needed. In my village we have 3 bad grocery stores. We could have had 1 big instead of 3 small. In the nearest town, Narvik, it is tons of small and useless grocery stores. No big ones. And it is like that everywhere here. Except from in the big cities, Oslo, Trondheim, Bergen etc. 

I found something very interesting about lecithin. But first, I tried to translate Delfiafett. I didn't get anything. So I tried Delfiakake, and I got "Hedgehog slice". I searched for images, and yes, it is the same. So the translation will be "Hedgehog slice fat".

I tried to search like crazy to find any fats with lecithin. I finally got a match when I searched for oil and lecithin, or something like that. Then I found out that lecithin is used as an antioxidant. They have made several studies about the antioxidant properties of lecithins. I didn't read them now, because I have to push myself in the shower and get ready for work. But I read quickly the abstract of one of them. And lecithin does work very well as an antioxidant for oils (but not all oils, it seemed). I find that very interesting. Maybe we can buy lecithin supplement pills from iHerb and pop them in our oils for better storage?

Here is a link from Google search results, if someone want to find out more: https://www.google.com/search?num=4...91...0j0i131k1j0i67k1j0i22i30k1.0.jjt8FjkvZ8c

Shortening, yes, I think the other fat we have, the Flott matfett (translation: Great foodfat) can be the same as shortening. We don't have Crisco and things like that. So yes, I think Flott matfett is shortening, because I know that it replaced something called Smult, which is lard. 

https://www.google.com/search?num=4...0i67k1j0i22i30k1j0i8i13i30i19k1.0.LV5aox4u5OY
https://www.google.com/search?num=4...0i67k1j0i22i30k1j0i8i13i30i19k1.0.LV5aox4u5OY


----------



## earlene (Jul 12, 2018)

The purpose of the lecithin is to prevent the fats from separating out and to prolong the storage of said foodstuffs. It may be the be the type from non-GMO soybeans to meet the European market standards, but it can also be a product of animals, as well.

In any case, I would not expect it would interfere with soapmaking in the minimal amounts used to create the texture in that particular CO product. One way to test that would be to try it small batches and compare to another purer brand of CO. But if that is all that is available, I'd still use it without concern.


----------



## Zany_in_CO (Jul 13, 2018)

Have you tried shopping on line at iherb.com ? They have Spectrum (brand) Shortening which 100% palm oil and coconut oil. Maybe others but didn't take time to look. I would by the cheapest, i.e., doesn't have to be virgin or organic, just pure coconut oil. It was recommended by an American black lady Expat living in Norway for 9 years who has a cooking blog.


----------



## Rune (Jul 13, 2018)

Thank you Zany! iHerb, yes, a great idea! I have shopped there before. I will have a look and see what they have.

I can find palm oil here, from immigrant shops. It is called Khanum vegetable ghee. First, I thought that I wouldn't buy it because it isn't  RSPO, sustainable and that sort. It doesn't say so, so I guess it isn't. But, I guess that doesn't matter here where I live. Because, when I fill gas on my car, I fill 20% of the worst sort of palm oil. Lately it has been in the media here, that the government have (we have the worst ever horrible government) decided that biofuel should be 20% of gas and diesel, to save the planet. But, the biofuel is ten times worse than petrol and diesel. So, to avoid filling the rainforest destructive palm oil, I have to drive to another village to find another gas station (approximately 20 minutes drive). Here, we have Shell and Esso (Exxon), and both use palm oil biofuel. And I can't drive all over the country to find something else than Shell and Esso.

So, if I buy some vegetable ghee with palm oil to put in my soap, that most likely is not RSPO, that will be nothing compared to what I have on my gas tank. So I guess it is okey, sort of.


----------



## Gemoke (Jul 13, 2018)

soapmaker said:


> I was going to post this in the lotion forum but here is the coconut oil breakdown so I will post it here. Why is fractionated coconut oil called a "drying oil?"


I think is a little confusion here. Fractionated coconut oil (the caprilic-capric trigliceride) is called dry oil, because it is absorbed very quickly in the skin, it doesn't live an oily or sticky feeling on your skin. A soap made with lot of coconut and not too much superfat can be drying. This is because of its chemistry. So a same amount of coconut oil compared with any other oils will produce the biggest amount of soap molecules (this is why the SAP is the highest here). And because this soap molecules have a shorter lipophilic part it means that they are more water soluble and stronger detergents. So they clean pretty well our skin and makes it dry.


----------



## Iluminameluna (Aug 8, 2018)

Just wanted to comment regarding the availability of different oils available overseas compared to the U.S.
I live in a subtropical country where I can't get oils, butters or fats easily. Shipping to this country is prohibitive plus there's no security in the postal system, so you couldn't even be sure to get your supplies, unless you pay for an international shipping service in-country. Not cheap!
However, what I've found from reading labels is that, except for olive oil (which I CAN get from an American-type big box store), most cooking oils are either palm oil, soybean, beef tallow or a mix of them. HO canola, a type like rapeseed, HO sunflower and a soy-olive blend are quite accessible. Lard (pig fat) not so much. Coconut oil (virgin or 76°), available with a guarantee of purity, is $8/lb!
Needless to say, my soaps are usually 25% or so of each oil: canola , sunflower and olive, with about 10% CO and 5% castor oil (same price as CO!). Canola and sunflower oils are the cheapest, at $9-10/1.5 gallons. Palm with soy comes in at $.75/lb, not cheap but it creates a great bar of soap.
Lucky for me, pure sea salt is $.12/lb! So if I run out of purified seawater, I can just make some, which helps in the hardening of my soap bars, without compromising sudsing quality.
I hope this info helps someone.


----------

