Disaster with later added oil

[MrsBaker]

I was teaching my friend to make soap. She bought all the ingredients, and was also doing all the work, based on the recipe I made on Soapcalc. She did the lye water and started adding oils in the oil bucket one after another, she realized she didn't buy enough castor oil. I tried to save the lye water and the oils she had already mixed together, and was able to adjust the recipe so that it would still have the same 5% superfat. Everything went well and she poured the soap batter into the molds... and I saw the lard bucket there... unopened!

I have never done rebatching, and thought it would still work if we quickly melted the missing amount of lard, and take all the soap back to the pot and mix it well... so she did that and the batter was looking normal, smooth and thoroughly mixed together. I thought we were able to save it. Wrong. It didn't want to harden, and after a few days it separated.

Was there a way to save it, was my idea of adding the oil to traced soap batter insane thing to do, or did we just have bad luck? Should we have let it harden even though it was lye heavy, and then next day grate it, melt it and add the missing amount of oil?

Thanks for your ideas!

What I learned from that...
Check that you have all the ingredients you need, and enough of them!!

Always, always double check, triple check that all the oils are in the bucket before adding the lye water. (I always have done that when making soap by myself...)

Never make soap together with anybody, you get distracted and might forget something. I have made soap for about 4 years, and never had a failure!

I was so disappointed!!

 

[DeeAnna]

You could have added the missing lard at trace just as you did, but then switched to a hot process method. (Although if the soap didn't harden, perhaps the lard was in there already?) Anyways, HP would probably have been better than to keep going with a cold process method.

But honestly it's so very easy to overlook what would work best in the heat of moments like this. Don't be hard on yourself -- things happen. You and your friend didn't get hurt, you both got some good experience, and next time things will work out better.

 

[MrsBaker]

Thanks DeeAnna! If that ever happens again, I make sure that will switch to HP. "live and learn"

Have a Happy Easter everybody!

 

[dixiedragon]

Bummer! I'm surprised it didn't work!

The few times I have soaped with non-soapers, I have learned that a) check off each ingredient and b) have all ingredients laid out in the order you will be adding them. It's so easy to get distracted.