Advice for new recipe

[esheh195]

Hi everyone, thanks for all the helpful tips and advice found on here.
I recently started to renew my interest in soaping after making only 2 batches last year. My first one this year was a 100% coconut oil soap with 20% SF. I love it but my wife wanted a bit more lather and creaminess.
For our next batch, I wanted to include a few other oils. I came up with this on SoapCalc and wanted to hear thoughts on it before I commit to it and try it in the morning.
olive oil 40%, Coconut Oil 35%, Castor Oil 15% and Avocado Oil 10%
The numbers seem okay on soapcalc but is there anything you would change here? I'm hoping for a nice, hard, long-lasting bar with a good bubbly lather.

 

[AustinStraight]

I would lower the coconut to 30% at the most, lower the castor to 10% at most, and up the olive oil a bit to compensate. Too much coconut with a low superfat will dry out your skin easily, and too much castor will make soap tacky and sticky. Adding 1 tablespoon of sugar per pound of oil is a popular way to add lather to soap.

 

[Nevada]

Welcome aboard! Your Castor and Coconut is high.
Adding some Palm Oil or Lard would be recommended for a newbie.
This is a great bar with no Palm/lard and will make a hard glossy bar - eventually.
Olive 70
Coconut 25
Castor 5
SF 10

Try this with palm/lard and your avocado.
Olive 40
Coconut 25
Palm or Lard 20
Avocado 10
Castor 5
SF 8%
using soap Calc? http://www.soapcalc.net/calc/SoapCalcWP.asp
Roy

 

[esheh195]

Thanks for the replies. I appreciate the feedback. I never heard of adding sugar to the batch--thanks for the tip, I think I'm going to give it a try.
I'll also try to adjust the oils, maybe 50% Olive, 30% coconut, 10% castor, 10% avocado. Would that still lead to a hard bar (even if it takes a longer cure time) with a good bubbly lather?

I'm hesitant to use lard or palm unfortunately. That's where I run into problems finding a good recipe online. I'm trying to keep the soap vegetable based and while palm would be great (and is in so many recipes) I'm trying to avoid it even if it comes from the more sustainable sourcing methods. Otherwise I would definitely use the second one that you mentioned, Nevada.

 

[Seawolfe]

Add the sugar to the water before adding the lye or it won't dissolve, that caught me up. It does add to the bubbles nicely.

I have yet to try lard, and only tried palm once, but still made lots of fun soaps. Try a salt bar!!

 

[yadonm]

You can use powdered sugar. It dissolves faster. I love avocado oil in soap.

 

[shunt2011]

Other than dropping the % of Coconut be sure to have a pretty good superfat 7-8% would probably be okay at 30% CO. I have used 15% Castor and did not have a sticky soap. However, after testing the diffference in my soaps I stay between 5-10% as there isn't much difference to me. If you want a really creamy thick lather, once you have some bars under your belt and are comfortable with the process give a salt bar a try. After a good cure they have awesome lather. They are generally 75-100% CO and I use 50-75% salt added at light trace with a 25% superfat. They are my favorite.

 

[esheh195]

Thanks so much for all the feedback and advice. I looked up salt bars and they sound great. Like you said, I'll definitely want to get a good number of bars under my belt before I attempt to make them, but I will definitely give them a try one day.

Everyone really helped here and we are going to try and make this batch in a few minutes. I dropped the CO and Castor and raised to SF to 7%, as well as adding a little bit of sweet almond oil. Here's the revised plan:
50% olive, 30% CO, 10% avocado, 6% castor, 4% sweet almond

What do you guys think of this? Would it lead to a nice bar of soap?

 

[AustinStraight]

Looks like it should be fine.

 

[esheh195]

Hey everyone, thanks for all the input. We finished the batch. We did 32 oz of oil with a superfat of 7% and the following percentages:
OO-50%, CO-30%, Avocado-8%, Castor-6%, Almond-6%.

We added a bit of Moroccan clay and a little essential oil blend of sweet orange, grapefruit and eucalyptus with a touch of frankencense. I've heard the citrus top notes won't stay long without a bottom note from what I've read here and elsewhere but it's for personal use and we'll go through it quickly.

Here's some pics of the finished batch and thanks again!

 

[esheh195]

Oh, and I also wanted to say thanks for the tip about the sugar. I added 2 tbsp based on the 32 oz of oils into the water before I added the lye as you recommended. I also kept the container of the lye mixture in a large bowl of ice water hoping that it would keep the heat levels of the solution in check. Figured it couldn't hurt.

 

[esheh195]

Hi everyone. Well, it's been a few weeks since this batch was made and I tested it out. The scent is faint but still there.. Though next time I will try and blend a more lasting scent bc I think there's a big chance the scent will fade in a little.
The soap is good and produced a nice bubbly lather that washes off clean and felt smooth on the skin though it's not as bubbly as the CO soap I made previously.
The only major complaint is that when the bar diminishes to half it's size, it's rather soft. I like a nice hard bar straight down to the end instead of one I feel is going to fall apart, so that was disappointing.
I think I will try the recipes that Nevada mentioned next. I just made an oatmeal bar which I posted in the photo forum, but I think I will try those other recipes now and see how I like them as a nice base recipe. So far my fav is still CO though.