Adding Citric Acid Last- Lush Bath Bomb Technique?

[ElleJay]

Every bath bomb or bubble bar recipe that I have ever made involves mixing your well blended dry ingredients with your oils/fragrance/poly80 or wet ingredients. Today I came across an old article in Marie Claire with photos from a Lush tour. They included photos of an employee making bath bombs and gave a very broad overview of ingredients and how they are assembled. The instructions showed the employee blending their baking soda and colorant with oils and butters until completely mixed and then right before molding, they added the citric acid.

Is there a benefit to adding citric acid after mixing your dry and wet ingredients? I’ve always heard that you should mix your baking soda and citric acid before adding any additional dry ingredients and then mixing in oils and liquids.

 

[artemis]

I just saw them do this on a Royalty Soaps video. I think maybe it reduces the chances of the CA, BS, and water reacting with each other when you mix them together.

 

[shunt2011]

I always add my citric acid last. It works a charm.

 

[LilyJo]

Me too

 

[srenee]

It keeps down on the reacting. I do that as well.

 

[jcandleattic]

Yep, adding the CA last helps avoid any reaction you may get. I've been doing this with mine for years, and it works great.

 

[Bubble girl]

Thanks for the info! I’m a newbie and need all the help I can get...so it’s best to add wet and dry ingredients, mix and then add CA?

 

[Kosmerta]

This is how I make my bath bombs. I try to estimate how much moisture i will need to make my bombs stick together once the dry citric acid is added so i will add that amount of witch hazel and mix it in before mixing in the citric acid. The dry ingredients absorb a lot of the moisture and prevent the fizz reaction from happening prematurely.

 

[Bubble girl]

Thank you! I found an article on what each ingredient in the BB does, like emulsifier, carrier oil etc. I can’t find it now, do you have any idea where it might be?

 

[Kosmerta]

Thank you! I found an article on what each ingredient in the BB does, like emulsifier, carrier oil etc. I can’t find it now, do you have any idea where it might be?

I haven't seen anything like that unfortunately. I starting making bath bombs years ago from a tumblr how to that just said to mix 2 parts baking soda with 1 part citric acid and add food coloring. Since then I've just retained little tidbits from various how to posts on pinterest and from Soap Queen recipes. Did you find that article posted somewhere here on SMF?