CP Soap in decorative molds?

[MadMadamMim]

I did do a search, but didn't come up with much. My brother in law gifted me with some lovely plastic individual soap molds. I know these are generally for M&P soap but has anyone successfully used CP soap in these? One of them is fairly detailed.

On a whim, I made more soap this weekend and decided to use these molds. I spritzed the insides with isopropyl alcohol per a discussion on etsy I found. Not sure if that was the right thing to do or not but I'll let you know :wink:

Anyone have any tips or experience to share with a newbie? Many thanks!

 

[Obsidian]

I have some molds like this and they work ok but you have to be patient and let the soap get plenty hard before trying to unmold. If there is a lot of detail, brushing the inside of the mold with mineral oil works great. You use a very tiny amount and wipe the excess away.

 

[MadMadamMim]

Many thanks, Obsidian. How long do you think I should wait before attempting to unmold, a week or so?

 

[Obsidian]

I usually start checking after three days. If the sides pull away cleanly, I will try and pop one out. If it seems sticky I will either give it a couple more days or maybe pop it in the freezer for a couple hours.

 

[Sinful7]

I use them quite often. Depends on the recipe when it can be popped out. With my basic recipe I can normally pop them out after a day. If you make a softer bar it may be more.

 

[MadMadamMim]

Thank you both for the advice!

 

[moonbeam]

Here's what I did: make the soap as always, when it's been about 24 hours, I pop them in the freezer for a few hours, then I dip the back of the mold in hot water and the condensation will make them pop right out. A word of caution: some plastic will crack, it depends on the plastic used, but I have used this method for a long time and it works well for me!

 

[Eve]

I have used sillicone molds to make flower-soaps and leave-soaps, mixed results. It did work, some of the finer detail in the leaves got a few cracks - could I remedy that with mineral oil? I don't have mineral oil, but would vaseline (the pure stuff) work?

 

[dixiedragon]

I like mineral oil. I would be concerned that the Vaseline is too thick and would fill-up the tiny details so the soap couldn't get into them. But I have used Vaseline on my log mold and it's great.

I really recommend freezing with the individual molds. A lot of mine have cracked over time, and I think working them back and forth trying to loosen soap really contributes to that.

 

[kyliecoast]

Harder oils will make a harder soap which can be unmoulded from decorative moulds sooner. If I make a mainly tallow soap I can unmould from my rose muffin cups within 24 hours. You could also try a water discount.

 

[MadMadamMim]

Thank you for the replies! My soap is still not quite hard... I made a similar batch to my first batch which had a really high % castor oil and it took a long time before it hardened. I'll try the freeze and hot water on the back of the mold trick, thanks moonbeam.

I didn't have any problems with the silicone molds... just the hard plastic ones.

 

[seven]

i use mineral oil too, and freeze the soap prior to unmolding. the soap come out cleaner and smoother this way.

i have a love n hate relationship with plastic molds. their designs can be so cute but unmolding can be a pita.

 

[MadMadamMim]

Welllllll, I got them out. There are a few air bubbles and a corner dent where I dropped the first bar, but they turned out better than I thought!

I ended up pouring when the soap batter was very thick because I added green clay at trace, not knowing that I needed to mix it up separately to get it to disperse. (This is only my second batch of soap, so I am learning all sorts of things! ) To try and get it to mix in meant lots of whisking which thickened things more than I intended. You can still see some globs of the clay. Sorry for the horrid quality of the photo... I only have a very used phone for a camera.