HELP PLEASE!!!!

[gothikfairy21]

Okay so I have never soaped before. So here is my problem. I went out and got everything I needed for an unscented batch of soap. But I have some coffee grounds that I plan on trying out to see if that would work for some scent. Here is the thing. I could only afford vegetable oil for right now. And oh my Lord, I cannot believe I did it, but I totally forgot a thermometer. :shock: :roll: I know right, but I forgot that I would have to use that, especially since I bought an oil that was liquid. So here is my question. Do I have to heat up my oil? :?: If so it will be even longer before I can attempt my first batch. :cry: I am so bummed. Someone please help me out? Thanks Jina!

 

[danahuff]

Most of the recipes and tutorials I've seen recommend heating oil to 100º. I actually don't do that, and my soap comes out fine. I know some folks would consider it sacrilege, but I use coconut oil, shea butter, and palm oil in my main recipe, all of which are more or less solid (or somewhat solid) at room temperature. I melt them in the microwave in 20-second increments, checking to see if they're melted or need to be melted longer.

However, where you will need the thermometer more, and where I actually use it, is in knowing when the lye and water (or other liquid) is at 100º (or whatever the recipe calls for). The temperature of the lye is important. I think the oils are pretty close to 100º by the time I mix them all together after they've been microwaved.

The first batch of soap I made, the only "solid" oil I used was coconut, and I melted it in the microwave, but didn't heat my other oils at all, and that batch came out fine.

 

[new12soap]

Okay so I have never soaped before. So here is my problem. I went out and got everything I needed for an unscented batch of soap. But I have some coffee grounds that I plan on trying out to see if that would work for some scent. Here is the thing. I could only afford vegetable oil for right now. And oh my Lord, I cannot believe I did it, but I totally forgot a thermometer. :shock: :roll: I know right, but I forgot that I would have to use that, especially since I bought an oil that was liquid. So here is my question. Do I have to heat up my oil? :?: If so it will be even longer before I can attempt my first batch. :cry: I am so bummed. Someone please help me out? Thanks Jina!

If you are using coffee grounds, make sure they are very finely ground and use them sparingly, they are VERY scrubby, and no the scent really doesn't survive after the cure. It makes a good deodorizer though. But since this is your first batch I would probably recommend holding off on additives until you have a few batches under your belt.

Have you run your recipe through a lye calculator? ALWAYS make sure you do, even if you are using a recipe! I think just using vegetable oil is going to give you a very soft soap that will take a while to firm up.

You can gently warm your oil a bit, or you can do a search for room temp cold process, a lot of people just use the hot lye solution with room temp oils. HTH Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

 

[ToniD]

You can feel the outside of the pan for an approximation of the temp. But when I use an all liquid oil, I don't heat it. The cooler oils will slow down how Long it takes to get to trace--depending of course on how warm your lye solution is.

 

[Hazel]

I don't know what type of vegetable oil you have but the one I have is soybean oil. Soybean by itself will not make a nice soap. As new12soap already stated, it will be very soft. It's also prone to rancidity even in soap which is why it's recommended to use a low percentage so you don't get DOS. Zen Soap has a great page on single oil soaps which you will find helpful. http://www.zensoaps.com/singleoil.htm

I recommend you wait until you get some other oils. You can find coconut, lard, tallow and olive in the grocery. You can find castor oil in the pharmacy section. You can make a nice soap just with grocery oils.

The other people also mentioned room temperature oils or only slightly warmed. After you mix the lye solution, place the palm of your hand against the side of the container. It won't be too hot to add to the oils if the container just feels warm against your palm. I do suggest if you have a silicone mold to warm it before pouring the soap into it and then wrap it in a towel. I've found this helps to ensure gelling (sort of). I did have partial gelling but it didn't bother me although it might bother some people.

Whoops! I just saw ToniD mentioned checking the outside of the pan for temp.

 

[gothikfairy21]

Well I did a batch, I figured even though the soybean oil, which is exactly what my oil is, was prone to turning rancid and even the DOS, I was just so excited to get started. Yeah, super fail. I used a recipe that I found online, which I will not bash the recipe, but it was a super fail. But here are a few reasons I think it was such an epic fail. One, no thermometer, so I am not sure how much that counts I just feel like maybe everything was all messed up with not knowing my temps, remember we are like chemists here. Two, no digital scale, now this recipe called for 5 ounces of lye, which when I did my research was 10 tablespoons? Again, we are chemists, so I really need a scale. And since I don't have a scale, I really super should have ran it through a lye calculator. And three, and this one is really important, and I will explain myself. I didn't have a stick blender. Now I know the lye is the most important, but this soap it said would take a while to trace, and that was with a stick blender! So I stirred for over a whole hour, no lie my husband watched the entire movie Thor while I sat and stirred. Well I don't know how a good trace really looks, I have seen videos but you can't tell everything from videos or really what other people say, sometimes you have to just dive in and do it yourself. Well I poured in my coffee grounds, which I found out about everything, not much scent, and how scratchy they are, at the point that I thought was trace, stirred for another 10 - 15 minutes, but it seemed like my soap would trace then go back to a thinner state. So finally after about one hour and thirty minutes of stirring I poured into my soap mold. Six hours later, I just checked it. It looks horrible. I can only laugh at this point. This is one of those moments that I hate with my whole heart, and that was hearing everyone who came on here and helped me, including Alchemy and Ashes, in unison say, "Told you so!!" LOL Well I can say now that I plan to try to go and buy the right tools as soon as I can. Until then, I just have to figure out where to dispose of my brown, murky, separated mess. The top is nothing but oil and coffee grounds and the bottom, well it looks like grits or cream of wheat. Oh well, I will not be discouraged. And thank you all for trying to help me.

 

[AlchemyandAshes]

Oh man, I would never say "I told you so"!
I am certainly a "learn the hard way" kinda girl myself...though at the ripe age of 38, I think I'm finally learning a wee bit o' patience :? Just a wee bit... :shock:
We just get so excited that we get ahead of ourselves sometimes Don't worry too much about your first batch. My first batch turned into a "unexpected" rebatch!
Once you've been soaping for a while and experience some of those "er, not what I expected" batches, you'll get the hang of it. Those batches are what we learn the most from...and from other people's experiences on this forum :wink:

Your next mission: 8)

1. Find a cheap digital scale that weighs to the .00 of an ounce (and/or in grams) and a stick blender...both about $20 at Wal-Mart ( so you can get a "quick fix" and not have to wait for shipping :wink: )

2. At said WalMart you shall attain LouAna Coconut Oil, Castor Oil from the pharmacy, and some Olive Oil (not extra virgin) or Lard, if you prefer. (Lard has a different SAP value than Olive Oil, so run recipe thru a lye calculator first)

3. Carry out production of 2 lb batch discussed in previous message.

4. Meet back here and let us know "Mission Accomplished!" :!:

Good luck!