help with percentages for a coconut oil/milk shampoo bar?

[sprigs]

i would really like to make a cold process shampoo bar/body soap as the one i usually buy is unavailable in my country at the moment. ive made a couple of cold process soaps before and theyve turned out nice enough to give to people as presents, but i had an exact recipe to follow with measurements and this time i dont!

the ingredients id like to use are: coconut oil, coconut milk and lavender oil (plus some crushed lavender flowers within the soap too). id like to make a pretty hard bar that once cured ill be able to leave in the bathroom (on a wooden slotted soap rack/dish thing) without it turning mushy or crumbling.
i was wondering if anyone could give me an idea of the percentages of each ingredient i should use to make the bar?

thanks so much in advance

 

[lsg]

Re: help with percentages for a coconut oil/milk shampoo bar

I usually use about 30% coconut oil in my soaps. Make sure you use a lye calculator such as SoapCalc and run any recipe through it before making soap. You can freeze coconut milk to the slushy stage and use it as 100% of the liquid. You will have to be very careful not to scorch it though. I suggest setting the lye container in an ice water bath and stirring constantly as you very slowly add the lye to the frozen coconut milk. Or you can substitute coconut milk for a percentage of the liquid, dissolve the lye in water and add the coconut milk at thin trace. I think you will be dissapointed if you add lavender blossoms to your soap, I have read that they turn brown. I usually add about .50 ounce essential oils for every pound of oils used.

 

[Hazel]

Re: help with percentages for a coconut oil/milk shampoo bar

What other oils were used in the shampoo bar you used? Knowing the other ingredients would help people to be able to give advice.

 

[Lindy]

Re: help with percentages for a coconut oil/milk shampoo bar

If you are looking to create a shampoo bar you need to learn the properties to each oil. Coconut oil is one of the most cleansing as is palm kernel oil which make them less than desirable in a shampoo since you do not want to strip the hair.

Look for oils that are conditioning and gentle.