Coconut Bubbly Shower Bar?

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Anstarx

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I got the original recipe from the Spruce, swapped palm for lard and modified the percentages a little. My plan is to make a very bubbly shower bar that looks and smells like coconut jello.
I read somewhere that soap used for body should have it's CO lower than 30%. I have fairly oily skin especially in summer so I'm curious if I can raise the percentage.
The recipe I plan to use is:
25% lard
25% olive
30% coconut
10% castor
10% canola
100% coconut milk for water
SF 3%
I bought a coconut FO but I think it contains vanilla, plus the coconut milk will go yellow when mixing with lye so I will need some white colorant to make a really white bar. My question here being should I go for mica or TiO2? Will my recipe be really bubbly? Can I raise CO to improve cleansing? Should I add in sugar to help lather, if so, how much?

Thanks for any help!
 
Personally, 30% CO and only 3% SF will be extremely drying to the skin for many. Also, keep in mind, the more oils you strip from oil prone skin the more it will produce. So you need to find a happy medium point.

I use 22-25%. So, I would lower the CO or up the SF. I don't have super oily skin anymore. I would also drop the Castor to 5-7%, it stabilizes the lather but too much can make a soft bar of soap. Otherwise, I say go for it. If you want to add sugar use 1tsp PPO and dissolve it a bit of water. Just subtract the water amount from your Coconut Milk. With that much coconut plus castor and coconut milk you will have plenty of later. Probably don't even need sugar.

Also, just beware that I haven't found much in the way of Coconut FO that doesn't come out smelling like plastic and doesn't stick for long.
 
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Have you tried a 100% coconut oil bar with high superfat? Even with the high superfat, I find them very bubbly and cleansing.
Otherwise, I think your recipe above looks fine- give it a try and see if you like it! Even with my oily skin, 30% is about as much coconut oil as I can tolerate. You want to cleanse, but not strip away all the natural oils.
Oh, and you can add TD or white mica to a discoloring FO, but it probably won't make a big difference in color. It might just be a lighter shade of brown.
 
The recipe looks like it should be fine for someone with oily skin, and be nice and bubbly, but make a small batch in case it turns out that it's too drying for you. I use 30.5 % coconut in my tallow/lard formula as well as 11% castor oil, and it makes a wonderfully bubbly soap that is not drying to me and my family, but I do superfat it at 8%.

Re: sugar: I add sugar to all my soap batches (except for my 100% coconut oil soaps with a 20% superfat- doesn't need it!) I use it at a rate of 2 tbsp ppo. Anything less than that, I don't notice a whole lot of difference in bubbliness, and anything much more than that leads to a softer soap.

RE: coconut fragrance oil: as with Shunt (and soooooo many others), I have yet been able to find a good one that really smells like coconut and is good and strong and does not morph in soap. I've been searching for years. I did come pretty close once with an FO called Under The Palm Trees from Daystar, but it was on the weak side and they eventually discontinued it. It really makes me wonder where these big commercial companies who make strongly scented coconut soaps are buying their fragrance from.

Re: discoloration from the coconut milk: Have you tried making your coconut milk soap via the split method, i.e., mixing your lye amount with an equal amount of water, and then adding the rest of your required liquid amount as coconut milk that's been fortified with enough powdered coconut milk in order to compensate for the water amount that went to mixing with the lye? Making milk soaps in this manner really helps to cut down on discoloration. You won't get a totally stark white soap, but you won't get a tan or a brown one either. Mine turn out ivory colored, but if I add about 1/2 tsp ppo of titanium dioxide to my batter, they come out a nice shade of white.

To get a nicely white soap, go with TiO2 instead of mica. White mica has never been able to get my soaps as white as TiO2 does.


IrishLass :)
 
If your shower bar is going to be a white, single color, with no design of some sort, you can play around with a lot of different stuff to get more bubbles, since you don't have to worry too much about the soap batter accellerating.

If you have oily skin and want a cleansing bar for the shower, yes, 30% coconut is probably fine. But what I would have done, is to add something really hard to stabilize the lather, get it more shaving foam-like. Add something high in stearic acid, like soy wax or something else. And then, if you want more bubbles (and that shaving foam like lather), I think you definately need to use dual lye.
5% KOH and 95% NAOH, that is a good allrounder in a dual lye recipe. But you need to use a lye calculator that does dual lye, you can NOT just take out 5% of the NAOH amount and replace it with KOH. Dual lye is easy, the only thing you have to choose is the percentage of each lye, and it will be automatically calculated for you. So it is super easy and will give much more lather (and a better type of lather, I think), especially if you combine it with as high as 30% coconut + 10% castor.

You could add sugar as well (but you might not need it if you go for dual lye). If you don't use dual lye, I would definately add sugar to boost bubbles. Dump it in the water and dissolve it there before you add the lye (it can or will be amber colored, depending on how much you sugar you add), or heat up some water in the microwave and dissolve the sugar in that and blend in with the oils.

If it is a simple, single color soap (goes quickly in the mold), you could also do a water discount. For example use a 35-40% lye solution. If you choose water as percentage of oils, remember that the default value of 38% water is by many considered as too much water. I agree (unless you need much water to give you time to work with advanced designs). I would rather go for 33-35% of oils. But for a single colored soap without design elements, I would use a 40% lye solution. Just have everything ready, so you have time to dump it in the mold before it eventually thickens up before your very eyes. Lard is said to be slow moving, as is olive oil, so it might work just fine. I'm just prepared for disaster all the time, becuse that's what I'm used too. And I didn't know that a strong lye solution could make it worse. But it can. But a strong lye solution and pouring at thick trace will remove or minimalize the problem with soda ash on the top and glycerin rivers inside. So it is not all bad. It is also less water that has to evaporate out when curing.

I would also add kaolin clay. For example a tablespoon per pound of oil (just blend it in the oils). That is not a low amount of clay, but I think it will help improving your lather and give slip and silkiness to your shower soap. Castor can be used in higher amounts if you make sure to have enough hard oils in your mixture, and if you use something to balance out the drag they say castor can give in higher amounts. 10% is considered quite high, but it is not too high. If you use clay together with a higher amount of castor, it will feel very slippery and nice, in my experience.

I would drop the 10% canola oil and replace it with something hard, like soy wax, shea butter or whatever with a high amount of stearic acid (but not use pure stearic acid in cold process soap, it will seize the soap if you use it over a few percent). I would do that for two reasons - improve the lather and give a longer lasting soap for the shower. You could also replace the canola with palm oil (high in palmitic acid, which is very good too). Or just skip the canola and use 10% more lard instead.

If you use dual lye, the soap will be slighly shorter lasting. But if you add more hard oils, it will sort of balance that out again. You could also harden the soap by adding some sodium lactate or replace some of the lye water with vinegar (if you choose vinegar, you will have to do some maths or find a lye calculator that allows you to add vinegar as an additive, and it will do the maths for you). Salt will also harden soap, but since maximum lather is important for you, salt is not a good choice as it will reduce lather.

If you add sugar, high amount of clay, high amount of castor oil and more hard oils, you probably will not have a recipe you can work with for hours. It may thicken rapidly. But if it should be a single white color, you can just blend the titanium dioxide in with the oils beforehand, add the lye, get trace and pour it straight into the mold. It should be enough time for that unless you use a fragrance that will seize it in seconds.

I don't know what milk or coconut milk will do in soap. I have not really tried, so I have no opinions on that, and I have no clue on how to best add it.

Good luck, I think you will have a wonderful bar of soap for the shower, whatever you choose to do or not :thumbs::) I think I will have to make one too. I have lots of soy wax I must use before it is too late.
 
>shunt

I sweat a ton and the weather in summer here is so humid that I’m pretty much swimming in sweat when I got home. This is why I want a really cleansing soap as normal shower gel had been leaving me feeling not cleaned enough.

I just made a test batch w/o FO just to try and see if it’s too cleaning. If it’s too drying I will drop the CO to 25% then.

>Cellador

I’ve read about the 100%CO+20%SF! I do plan to make it someday but also read that’s very moisturizing for dry skin? I’ m worried that it might get too moisturizing

>IrishLass

Wow I didn’t know it’s so hard to get a good coconut FO! Now I’m a bit weary about using my FO. It’s just really so hard to get decent FO here if you don’t want the regular lavender, rose, lemon, etc. I had to order this FO from a factory that only offer either 10mL sample or 1kg bottle. Maybe I should go for another FO or EO...minty lemon jello still sounds delicious, right?

I only have liquid coconut milk so I froze them into ice cubes, mixed with some water and then add lye. This is how I usually dissolve lye and usually the solution stays cold when everything dissolved. However the coconut milk heat up much more and turned a sunny yellow. Guess I will try your method next time!

>Rune

Thanks for the detailed help!

I do have shea and soy wax left over from my candle adventure. I’ve read about using soy wax in soap but curious about its property. Is it only for hardness or is it moisturizing/cleansing/etc? Anyway I’d like to try that since I’m always curious about it.

I’ve never heard about the dual lye method, sounds promising! But what calculator do you use to calculate them? I use SoapCalc and it won’t let me select two types of lye at the same time.

Kaolin Clay certainly sounds likes a good idea especially for oily skin like me! I just ordered some and hopefully it will arrive soon.

As for blending time, I plan to use a muti-cavity silicone mold that shaped like jellos so I can just pour the soap in. Faster trace can actually help since I can scrap off excess easier.


Thanks for the help everyone! I really appreciate the help so far!

I was impatient and just made a batch last night with my original recipe, no colorant and no FO. Don’t have pictures yet but I will post them later.

The lye was yellow as I might burned my coconut milk a little, lemon-y yellow color. Both the oil and lye were pretty warm when I mixed them and traced after about 5 mins. Poured in mold and throw in the fridge.

I checked this morning, about 12 hours later, it’s now a pale creamy yellow, like butter color. It’s pretty solid already and should be ready to unmold tonight.
 
Easiest way to add milks in my humble opinion is powder lol and even then I've burnt it, in HP haha.

The lightest soap I've ever made had a high percentage of lard. And it's a nice soft creamy white without titanium dioxide. With a little of TD I expect you'll get a pure white.

We sweat terribly here, too.. And since we eat a lot of spicy food here at home you can imagine what we smell like when we're really dirty haha....

You'd think we'd have gone for a high coconut oil soap but, and you'll have to test yours first to know, 25% coconut with only the 3% SF is about as much as we can handle otherwise it's too drying, especially if there's lard in the recipe as well. I don't usually make soap that has more than 12-15 cleansing number.

And if your skin has to compensate for the stripped oils, you'll end up with even oilier skin, so that's something you'll have to pay attention to, especially if you use this on your face as well.

I made a comparison of lard n soy wax here, if you're interested.

This calculator is what I use, dual lye or not. It's much more simple and easier to use than others I've tried and best things is it's been tweaked from suggestions of this forum's members.

https://www.soapmakingfriend.com/soap-making-recipe-builder-lye-calculator/#
 
You'd think we'd have gone for a high coconut oil soap but, and you'll have to test yours first to know, 25% coconut with only the 3% SF is about as much as we can handle otherwise it's too drying, especially if there's lard in the recipe as well. I don't usually make soap that has more than 12-15 cleansing number.

And if your skin has to compensate for the stripped oils, you'll end up with even oilier skin, so that's something you'll have to pay attention to, especially if you use this on your face as well.

Many seemed to suggest 25% rather than 30%. I will try to change my recipe next. Considering I kinda give up on using coconut FO so I'd probably remake everything from scratch. I'm now considering a lemony bar with lemon zest and menthol crystal add in.

Anyway, to whoever is still interested, I finally got around to take pictures.
These are the unmolded bars. I think they are pretty white consider my lye is almost an egg yolk color.
I noticed some small white dots on the surface. I think they are maybe be stearic acid spots? Both my lye and oil are warm but I don't want the soap to gel so I popped the molds into the fridge as soon as I poured. Maybe that's the reason?

soap 1.jpg soap 2.jpg
 
They look nice :)

Try the 25% and see if it works for you then go from there. Since I started soaping I've experimented with less n less, and now normally use one with 18% and 2% SF. Won't be as bubbly so I use sugar or castor oil to help, if I have it.

The 25% one is only used by my son.. Which I sometimes use when I'm feeling exceptionally dirty lol that one is bubbly even without the castor. I'm sure he can do with less, he just doesn't care enough to tell me if it's drying or not lol
 
Menthol crystals are actually very gentle in soap, imo.....I love the idea that those crystals are extracted from a plant...the eo is nice too cornmint...Mentha arvensis..
Well, depends how much you put...
oh wait, we're talking CP...yes I expect they get cooked down a bit. I always use them in M&P and get a full-on tingle! ;-)
 

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