# Pine Tar Liquid Soap Revisited



## KristaY (Jan 30, 2016)

I want to (finally) try my hand at pine tar LS but I'm having a heck of a time deciding on the recipe. My PT bar recipe is: 

30% PO
30% OO
20% CO
5% Cocoa Butter
15% PT

Should I just convert that recipe to KOH or start over? If I use IL's base LS recipe of 65% OO, 25% CO and 10% castor, should I deduct the PT from the OO? If so, it would look like this:

50% OO
25% CO
10% Castor
15% PT

My other thought is when to add the PT? When making bar soap I add it after emulsification and stir like a crazy person to incorporate it before it's rock solid. But with KOH it might not have the lightening speed trace issue.

Sigh...I don't know... Maybe I'm making a mountain out of a mole hill and should make a small test batch of each.

I'd appreciate any and all opinions on the recipe and when to add PT, especially for those that have made it. I read through Seven's thread but she doesn't really say when she added the PT, just that she used only 5%. Here's the other thread:

http://www.soapmakingforum.com/showthread.php?t=48180&highlight=pine+tar+ls


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## IrishLass (Jan 31, 2016)

I've never worked with pine tar, but I just read Seven's thread, and it seems that she added the pine tar when making the paste (i.e., not during dilution).

This is just me, but I personally would not worry about the pine tar speeding up trace in liquid soap-making. If it does speed things up, it just means that you'll get to the paste stage all the quicker, which is a good thing. If it were me, I'd probably add it into the soap pot just after stirring  in the KOH solution.

As for which recipe to use, you could very well use your first one, I should think. If I were making it, probably he only thing I would be debating over is what % to super-fat it. lol


IrishLass


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## KristaY (Jan 31, 2016)

Thank you so much IrishLass! I've been pondering this all day so I appreciate your advice. I read through Seven's thread several times but still missed when she added the PT so thank you for catching that! 

I think I'm going to make my bar recipe and run it through soapcalc for KOH at 2% SF and see what happens. If the power stays on, I'll attempt it tonight. The weather outside is frightful!


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## KristaY (Feb 1, 2016)

It's done! It was very interesting working with the PT because it behaved a bit differently than my usual LS. The difference could be the PT or it could be the recipe. I decided to covert my NaOH recipe to KOH which is much different than my normal LS recipe. I set the SF to 1% because I'm going to add a SF oil after dilution. Probably meadowfoam but maybe SAO.

I decided to melt my oils because I used cocoa butter and wanted to make sure it completely melted. I always make LS in a crock pot because it's the largest soaping container I have and I can dilute right in the same pot. So as soon as the cocoa butter was melted, I turned it off and left it off. Then I mixed my lye with half the water volume and added the other half volume of glycerin (once the lye was completely dissolved).

I poured the lye mixture into the oils and stirred with a whisk for about 1 min then added the PT. I decided to use the whisk to stir (as opposed to SB) because I didn't know how the PT would behave in LS. It came to a very light trace within 5 minutes and was dark chocolate brown but stayed there so I used the SB and gave it a few pulses. This brought it to a med trace so I switched back to the whisk. It got to a stage that looked just like riced CP batter but it eventually smoothed out and became milk chocolate brown. It steadily moved along from there and I got flying bubbles 20 min after I added the lye. The bubbles were interesting. Normally when I get flying bubbles they're very tiny but these were larger (double or triple in size) and much easier to see. I stopped stirring and put the lid on.

10 min later, it's thick paste! Since it's late I'll just leave it until morning then zap test and dilute. I'm really happy at how smoothly it went!


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## DeeAnna (Feb 1, 2016)

Thanks for sharing your experience, Krista. I really appreciate learning how things went for this recipe. I have made a fair number of batches of pine tar bar soap -- DH won't use anything else -- but I have yet to try pine tar LS and I'm curious and want to try it myself.


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## Saponista (Feb 1, 2016)

I'm really interested to know whether you like it and what the lather is like. I made some pine tar bar soap for my husband but it stains the bottom of the shower tray brown when the bar drips. I think liquid would be a great alternative and it works great for his psoriasis.


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## KristaY (Feb 2, 2016)

DeeAnna said:


> Thanks for sharing your experience, Krista. I really appreciate learning how things went for this recipe. I have made a fair number of batches of pine tar bar soap -- DH won't use anything else -- but I have yet to try pine tar LS and I'm curious and want to try it myself.



You're very welcome DeeAnna! My hubby loves PT too but my SIL is CRAZY about it. He's the one that asked if it could be made into LS so both guys will be my test dummies. I'm headed up to see the kids tomorrow so I'll get SIL's report while I'm in Denver.



Saponista said:


> I'm really interested to know whether you like it and what the lather is like. I made some pine tar bar soap for my husband but it stains the bottom of the shower tray brown when the bar drips. I think liquid would be a great alternative and it works great for his psoriasis.



How interesting, Saponista. I haven't had the bar soap stain the shower tray but maybe the LS version will rinse away so it doesn't stain. Also, no dripping from wet bar. Hubby uses the bar as shampoo and face wash so I'll report what he thinks after he uses it for a week or so.

I spent most of yesterday diluting. I started out with 210gms paste and added 105gms distilled water. Every hour or 2 I added a bit of water (20ish gms at a time but 5 gms at a time as I got closer to dilution) until it was finally fully dissolved. The final amount of water I added was 245gms so if my math is right, that's 117% water to paste wt. I added 5gms tea tree blended with 5gms PS80. The diluted soap is clear but dark brown as expected and very thin. I warned DH he'll have to be careful when pouring it out, lol.

I washed my hands with it and got small, dense lather. My hands felt really soft, not dry at all, after drying off. I'll report back after my guys use it for a bit and give me their input.

ETA: I forgot to mention I zap tested the paste about 2 hours after I stopped whisking and it was already zap-less. Because it was midnight by then, I let it sit overnight. If it was earlier in the evening, I would have started to dilute.


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## nsmar4211 (May 15, 2016)

I may have to try this out....the more I use the bar pine tar the more I like it...


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## KristaY (Jul 7, 2016)

So here it is, several months later, and I forgot to report back on the feedback from all my guys. DH uses it as shampoo and facewash, SIL uses it as an all over body wash and my 18 y/o nephew uses it as a face wash. All LOVE it.

DH has gray, thinning hair plus dry patches on the top of his scalp from working outdoors all his life. Dermatologist is unconcerned about the dry patches but DH complains of itching in that area. Since using PT soap the itching and the dry patches are gone. 100% GONE! He'll now use nothing else on his head. 

SIL has no skin issues just loves the smell of PT. He has a beard so uses it on his face (and whole body), and says his beard feels softer plus it's easier (less irritating) when he trims up his beard. :clap:

Nephew has teenage zits. Not acne or even close, just spotty pimples. When I saw him after a month of use I couldn't believe how much clearer his face was. He's a musician so is often in the spotlight and is thrilled at how clear his complexion is. Not to mention how much better he feels around the girls!:clap:

I have a batch in the crock pot now and am thinking about the SF. Last time I added meadowfoam at 2% paste weight but I'm thinking about trying something different. On hand I have argan, HO sunflower, HO canola, jojoba, SAO and meadowfoam. I also have green tea extract. I'd love to hear any advice on what you guys think might be worthwhile. I can even split the SF into 1% of one and 1% of another. Throw any/all ideas at me!


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## DeeAnna (Jul 8, 2016)

Wow, you are seeing some good benefits from the PT soap, Krista! When you mentioned the dry patches on your DH's pate -- that is really interesting because now that you've brought that up and I've been thinking about it, my DH who is bald on top no longer has those unsightly dry patches either. He used to get them regularly and would scratch them sometimes until they would get irritated and bleed a bit. I had never made that connection until reading your latest post today. Hmmmm.....!


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## KristaY (Jul 8, 2016)

Excellent news DeeAnna! Not only am I happy for your DH those patches are gone, I'm happy your results mirrored mine. It's just a bit more reinforcement of how well PT soap works for various skin insults. I have a friend who's DH is a mailman. Because of the years of driving on the right with his right arm hanging out the open window, he's developed similar blotchy, dry patches. Again, the dermatologist was unconcerned but it drove him crazy. I gave her a bar of PT for him and it's about 90% improved after a month of use. So with all these PT lovers in my life, I have to be well stocked at all times!


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