Coconut Oil - Main Ingredient?

[LBussy]

So there's a classic commercial shave soap I love that lists the following as the ingredients:

Coconut Oil, Tallow, Stearic Acid, Potassium Hydroxide, Sodium Hydroxide, Water, Potassium Carbonate

I'm looking for a little help deconstructing it so I'm going to drop my notes here and maybe someone with more experience can tell me if I'm going wrong.

We know that the ingredients are listed in the order of use, so the stearic acid amount must be >= the amount of KOH. If this was a pure KOH soap with a 5% superfat the KOH would be at about 14.5%. Since this uses both (do any calculators figure this for you?) lets assume the lowest % of either lye will be about 7% for a nice round number.

So ... stearic acid => 7%?

Playing around with numbers, and knowing I probably want my Coconut as low as possible, I get the following as what I think will hold the most promise:

Cleansing still seems really high but the qualities of this soap make me believe it's a high tallow soap so .... comments are welcome.

 

[Susie]

You need this calculator:

http://summerbeemeadow.com/content/advanced-calculator-solid-cream-or-liquid-soaps

Use the cream soap setting with the KOH 90% checked.

There are folks with actual experience making shaving soaps in this forum, so I am going to let them help with the recipe. I just wanted to give you the calculator to play with until they chime in.

 

[LBussy]

Ooh that's awesome Susie, thank you!

I was sitting here trying to cobble something together with Excel, this is much easier.

 

[cpacamper]

Subscribed.

 

[wetshavingproducts]

I do not think it is actually possible to have more KOH & NAOH (not to mention it's 50/50) than water. The ingredients list looks like it's the post cure makeup. And even then, there's a good chance it's wrong.

 

[LBussy]

I do not think it is actually possible to have more KOH & NAOH (not to mention it's 50/50) than water. The ingredients list looks like it's the post cure makeup. And even then, there's a good chance it's wrong.

That is a good catch. This is a European product. Would their labelling be represented differently?

 

[Susie]

OK, since no one else is chiming in yet, I am going to give you what little I know about shaving soap. It is considered(if I recall correctly) a cream soap. So, threads about shaving soap should be on the liquid and cream soap forum. Here is a thread to get you started:

http://www.soapmakingforum.com/showthread.php?t=47002&highlight=shaving

 

[LBussy]

OK, since no one else is chiming in yet, I am going to give you what little I know about shaving soap. It is considered(if I recall correctly) a cream soap.

Well it's a cross between a cream and a soap, and it's hot process ... so it doesn't fit anywhere. Kinda like us crazy shaver dudes.

We've had some rousing conversations about these in this forum so I was hoping we could get one going again. Of course if the ingredients are misleading it will be difficult to draw any conclusions other than there's some in there.

 

[wetshavingproducts]

That is a good catch. This is a European product. Would their labelling be represented differently?

I think they have to follow INCI labeling rules, which if they are labeling the final products would be something like potassium cocoate, sodium cocoate or something like that. Going off the top of my head here so don't expect 100% accuracy on the names.

Point being, IMO, the label is just misleading and wrong.

 

[IrishLass]

OK, since no one else is chiming in yet, I am going to give you what little I know about shaving soap. It is considered(if I recall correctly) a cream soap. So, threads about shaving soap should be on the liquid and cream soap forum.

Now see- I used to think the opposite. I used to think that all shaving soaps were hard pucks! lol

While it's true that some shave soaps can be considered cream soaps (and hard pucks), not all of them actually fall into either of those categories. Some are hard pucks, some are scoopable creams, some are gels, some are foams...... and then we have the weird, hybrid kind of shave soap that's being talked about here- the croap (insert the sound of angels singing here :angel. lol It's too hard to be considered a cream soap and yet it's too soft to be included in the hard puck category. Now that I've made a few batches of them myself, I must say they are definitely different (in a good way) and special enough to deserve their own category to be sure! Maybe the forum powers that be could make a special section just for the crazy trouble-making wet-shaving dudes where every kind of shaving soap can be discussed.

I can only speak for myself, but based on how firm my own KOH/NaOH shaving croaps have come out in comparison with what I've experienced of cream soap, I feel they have much more in common with my 100% NaOH HP soap than anything else. They're not super hard like my CP shave pucks, and although I can dent them if I intentionally press them hard enough, they are still plenty firm enough to beautifully hold the puck shape that I molded them into just a few days after they were poured. The best way I can describe them is that they feel very much like how my 100% NaOH HP batches feel after about a 2-week cure.

In regards to the ingredients list that the OP trouble-making wet shaver dude mentioned, I agree- the placement of the water amount in the list is very 'off' if they are following any kind of semblance of decreasing incremental order. If you ask me, there's just no way that the listed order of the lyes and water can be right. I wonder what the story is behind that?

I was playing around with the 'recipe' this evening on SoapCalc and also Summerbee and wondered how 33.4% Coconut oil, 33.3% Tallow, 33.3% Stearic and a 60/40 KOH/NaOH combo with a 10% to 15% superfat would do?


IrishLass

 

[cpacamper]

Maybe the forum powers that be could make a special section just for the crazy trouble-making wet-shaving dudes where every kind of shaving soap can be discussed.
IrishLass

We promise not to leave stubble in the sink

 

[Cynthia]

Susie-
Nice RWE quote! I'm going to save that and post it to my fridge!

OK, since no one else is chiming in yet, I am going to give you what little I know about shaving soap. It is considered(if I recall correctly) a cream soap. So, threads about shaving soap should be on the liquid and cream soap forum. Here is a thread to get you started:

http://www.soapmakingforum.com/showthread.php?t=47002&highlight=shaving

 

[LBussy]

The soap is a classic, made commercially since 1899. I wonder if back then the ingredients were not necessarily listed in order and the packaging was never changed? On one of the shaving forums there's a gent who lives in Italy (and is a self-proclaimed evangelist of this soap) so I'll ask him if the local packaging is different. Maybe it's an export issue?

 

[Susie]

Susie-
Nice RWE quote! I'm going to save that and post it to my fridge!

I needed to remember that that day. Going to look for a new quote today.

 

[cpacamper]

The soap is a classic, made commercially since 1899. I wonder if back then the ingredients were not necessarily listed in order and the packaging was never changed? On one of the shaving forums there's a gent who lives in Italy (and is a self-proclaimed evangelist of this soap) so I'll ask him if the local packaging is different. MAybe it's an export issue?

Could this be Cella?

 

[LBussy]

Could this be Cella?

It is. There seemed to be a general avoidance of using the commercial names here so I didn't include it.

I posted on B&B hoping maybe Marco or someone might be able to shed some light.

 

[wetshavingproducts]

Well, assuming the oils are in the correct order, you can go anywhere between 50% CO to as low as 33% CO.

Songwind's recipe is more or less 50/50 CO to SA, if you replace some of that SA with tallow, you've got the correct order.

The recipe Deanna posted from that ancient book calls for 33% CO to 66% tallow, so replace some of that tallow with SA and you've got the correct proportions if you use 33% all around.

Potassium carbonate according to wikipedia is potash, which is old school KOH. I have no idea why it's there or what it's purpose is. Other than to keep with the really old recipe.