Failed Again *Sigh*

[Ttennis]

You're recipe looks fine, however, don't make such large batches. When they fail that's a lot of waste and expense. And that's way more oils than a 4 lb mold. I make 58 oz batches and I sell.

That's my goal is to eventually sell, but I have a long ways to go

 

[Ttennis]

I ran your recipe through SoapCalc and didn’t see any problems (see attached). With that much palm and coconut oil and the addition of milk (which has some sugar in it) it should be relatively quick to warm up and saponify, but it would also depend on your working temperature and how much you mixed it. I know that you don’t want it to heat up much because of the goat milk, but a little heat generation will tell you that saponification is starting. Sometimes when I work at a relatively low temperature (80s to 90s) with a soap batter that is at thin emulsion rather than light or medium trace, my soap only heats up a tiny bit and then it needs extra time in the mold to harden up. If I try to take it out of the mold too soon it is soft and crumbly, especially at the bottom. Based on your photos, the soap looks soft and crumbly, so one possibility is that you just need to leave the soap in the mold for another day or two. I’ve also had issues where the emulsion was too weak to make good soap. Although it didn’t separate in the mold, the soap took longer to harden and looked more grainy than a soap made with batter that was mixed to a heavier emulsion or trace. Another thing you could try is bringing the batter to a higher emulsion or light trace (if that’s not what you’re doing now). I make goat milk soaps in individual cavity molds that I put in the frig to keep cool, but for those I mix the batter to a solid light trace before I pour them. The last thing I can think of is that you are experiencing false trace. That could happen if the soap is too cool for the palm oil to stay liquid. The solution for that is to work at a higher temperature or stick blend a bit more. It might be easier to work things out using water instead of goat milk because you won’t need to worry about keeping the goat milk cold. You could also experiment with small batches. If you don’t have a small box, you can use a milk carton or any small box you have around the house as a mold.

It was really weird. The top had small cracks through it and was super hard, even to get the cutter through it. When it got midway through then it just crumbled. It seemed too dry to me. There was no softness to it :/

 

[Nivisoaps]

This happened to me a couple of times with goats milk. It turns out I let the temperature of the lye and oil get to cool (85 degrees). Now I soap at 90 and never have this problem. Then I put in the freezer over night so it doesn't gel, remove from mold and cut 24 hours later.

Hi, can we do this ? I mean we r supposed to cover the soap mould and let it sit for 24 hrs to finish the gel stage right? Why should we skip the gel phase?

 

[penelopejane]

Hi, can we do this ? I mean we r supposed to cover the soap mould and let it sit for 24 hrs to finish the gel stage right? Why should we skip the gel phase?

I prefer to gel my soaps because it is easiest way to avoid partial gel, colours are deeper, unmolds quicker, cures faster and feels nicer to me.

if you do the 50/50 split method you can use goats milk easily without overheating worries at all. Treat it like any other soap and force gel.

 

[Mobjack Bay]

It was really weird. The top had small cracks through it and was super hard, even to get the cutter through it. When it got midway through then it just crumbled. It seemed too dry to me. There was no softness to it :/

If it had cracks and the top was super hard it does not sound like slow soap was the problem at all . I had a batch of soap last fall that got hard on top and started to crack really quickly. I had to put it under a fan to cool it off. As I recall, it was so hard on top at the 8-10 hour mark that I took it out of the mold and cut it. In that case, I suspected the FO contributed to overheating because I used a recipe that normally behave fine. The somewhat grainy texture of your soap is a bit puzzling. Are you using Titanium dioxide? I’ve made a few batches that looked a bit grainy at first from TD, but they were fine after they cured.

 

[penelopejane]

I made another batch of soap (tried). It didn't come out good at all. I used goat milk, that was frozen, and lye slowly added, also in an ice bath. I think the milk still got too hot. It looked good in the mold, but the next day it was cracked on top. When I tried to cut it, it was a crumbly mess. I obviously missed something somewhere. What makes it crumble apart? And what do I do with it now? I'm getting so discouraged. I'm not good at percentage of this and percentage of that. I try to follow a spelled out recipe, like 20 oz of olive oil, 20 oz. of palm oil, etc..

I think this might have overheated a little (the cracks on the top indicate that) but I also think this has something to do with emulsion. Maybe it wasn't mixed enough to get to a good trace or else it dropped out of trace when you soaped so cool.

I'd try the split method and mix to medium trace.

 

[Arimara]

Thank you all for your suggestions. It really helps me
Is there anything I can do with this crumbled mess? Can it be rebatched in the crockpot?

If it doesn't zap, just grate it and make confetti soap. Rebatching can be dont as well.

 

[Ttennis]

If it doesn't zap, just grate it and make confetti soap. Rebatching can be dont as well.

How would I rewatch it?

 

[Arimara]

How would I rewatch it?

You would grate the soap, put it in a slow cooker to double boiler and add a small amount of water. I forgot how much you should use though. I feel like you can better preserve the pretty colors you used in a confetti soap. Rebatched soap can look way more rustic.

 

[Creek Soap]

I made another batch of soap (tried). It didn't come out good at all. I used goat milk, that was frozen, and lye slowly added, also in an ice bath. I think the milk still got too hot. It looked good in the mold, but the next day it was cracked on top. When I tried to cut it, it was a crumbly mess. I obviously missed something somewhere. What makes it crumble apart? And what do I do with it now? I'm getting so discouraged. I'm not good at percentage of this and percentage of that. I try to follow a spelled out recipe, like 20 oz of olive oil, 20 oz. of palm oil, etc..View attachment 44066View attachment 44067

I have been making GMS for about 4 years now. Recently and I don't know why...(company is monkeying with my lye???), but my traditional GMS is also VERY HARD AND CRUMBLY. I have been cutting it earlier and earlier, but today I finished making a batch around 10am and by 4pm it was hard, so I decided to take a chance and remove it from the mold to keep the heat level down (yes, it was still hot). It cut perfectly! Go figure...I'm still trying to figure this out. The very first batch I make years ago was not done until 24 hours later. Just in the past year, I have had this problem of this same particular soap recipe getting hot, cracking in about 1-2 hours, and being too hard to cut.