How to use vinegar to harden your soap

[topofmurrayhill]

Since I suck at math, will you tell me how much 5% acidity apple cider vinegar I need to mix with how much distilled water to make a 33.333% lye solution that will give me the needed 1.5% sodium acetate to saponify 8 oz olive oil with a 5% SF according to SoapCalc.

I just checked the jug from Soaper's Choice and my SL has "sodium lactate/60" on it. So, when making the solution for the SL, I just use 2% of the 8 oz, which ends up being 4.536 gm (I'll round to 5). No funky math for that, right?

Ugh, I forgot to deal with that 60% solution issue. No funky math for the SL but the other amounts have to be multiplied by 0.6. I'll get back to you with more numbers. I have to travel this evening plus I'm stuck using my phone to post at the moment.

 

[TeresaT]

Ouch!!
Never, ever wash your hands with a soap that hasn't set. You got lucky.
I used to work with commercial quantities of lye cleaning things to bare metal. If you hands start to feel the least bit slick you are headed for trouble there. With the soap you can't feel the slick that lye produces when it starts turning YOU in to - soap.

I have a vinegar / salt / lye mixture cooling now. I have noticed some precipitate so I'll be sure and stir the mixture until everything is in suspension before adding to the oils. I will probably gel this overnight so I won't be even checking on it for 12 hours after I make it. If it isn't firm enough to unmold I won't. I have more time than I have good sense so I can wait.

TT - your burns will turn to a rash looking scab before they heal completely if I remember correctly. They will be sensitive for several weeks too. I'm very glad it wasn't worse. Be careful please!!!

Steve

Thanks, Steve. Trust me, lesson well learned. I will never trust "just born" soap again. If it isn't at least 24 hours old and hard, I will wear gloves. I've been putting triple antibiotic cream on my hands each time I wash them. They hurt like heck, but aren't swollen anymore and the majority of the redness is gone. Right now they look severely chapped and have tiny red lines. Picture pinkish alligator hide with red cracks instead of the normal green and black combo. It could have been much worse. I'm very lucky I had that fancy new faucet. I would not have been able to turn the knobs on my old one.

BTW: Everyone, please feel free to use my photos and story as a warning for what can happen when you let your guard down. I never want anyone to experience that intense pain (and the pain I currently have) if a lesson can be learned from my mistake.

 

[Steve85569]

I waited until this morning to cut the salt brined batch. As I stated in an earlier post the salt did not seem to stay in solution. I did cheat and try 15% salt. That was probably a bit too much since the sodium acetate will take up some of the waters ability to bond with the sodium chloride.
I also had a bit of trouble with the White Gardena FO so I'm not sure if I got the spots from salt that wasn't still dissolved or from the FO. It looks like it's going to be a nice hard soap in just a few weeks though.

TT: Keep healing and never forget the lesson. Mr. Lye does not care what he eats. Lye is not your friend or enemy. It just eats anything that is or once was organic.

 

[topofmurrayhill]

Since I suck at math, will you tell me how much 5% acidity apple cider vinegar I need to mix with how much distilled water to make a 33.333% lye solution that will give me the needed 1.5% sodium acetate to saponify 8 oz olive oil with a 5% SF according to SoapCalc.

Sorry, it was a long day.

I know you don't need all of these numbers, but in this post I wanted to summarize the experiment we were talking about in its entirety.

It doesn't matter what units you use in these calculations. I'm going to use grams and calculate the amounts based on 1000 g oil. You could scale that to 8 oz by multiplying the ingredient amounts by 0.23, but I think some of the additive amounts might end up too small for you to measure accurately. You could do larger batches or we could increase the usage rates or both.

The sodium hydroxide and water amounts are based on 33.33% lye concentration and 5% lye discount.

For anyone who happens to notice, we are disregarding small inconsistencies in the water amounts between these scenarios.

-- No Additive
1000 g olive oil
257.4 g water
128.7 g NaOH

-- Sodium Lactate 1.20% (dry weight)
1000 g olive oil
257.4 g water
128.7 g NaOH
20 g 60% sodium lactate

-- Sodium Acetate 1.20% (equal weight)
1000 g olive oil
175.2 g vinegar
82.2 g water
134.6 g NaOH

-- Sodium Chloride 1.20% (equal weight)
1000 g olive oil
257.4 g water
128.7 g NaOH
12 g salt

-- Sodium Acetate 0.88% (equal molar amount)
1000 g olive oil
128.5 g vinegar
128.9 g water
133.0 g NaOH

-- Sodium Chloride 0.62% (equal molar amount)
1000 g olive oil
257.4 g water
128.7 g NaOH
6.2 g salt

 

[TeresaT]

I just ordered this scale from Amazon. It should be here on Friday. That will give me time to make the lye solutions and let them come to room temperature then make the soap on Sunday. I've been wanting a scale that will give me readings down to .001 gm for a while now. So this gave me the incentive to purchase a relatively inexpensive one that goes up to 50 gm. I hope it is actually accurate

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B011J88S8M/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

 

[Althea]

I need to replace SL in a HP 100% Coconut Oil soap recipe with a 30% SF as an additive (after Trace) at 3% PPO. We don't get SL where I live so need to substitute it. Would it be the same as per all the calculations already given.

Please forgive me, I did not do science, am not good in maths and am a serious newbie soaper who prefers HP.

Help and advice on the above is welcome.

 

[AliOop]

I need to replace SL in a HP 100% Coconut Oil soap recipe with a 30% SF as an additive (after Trace) at 3% PPO. We don't get SL where I live so need to substitute it. Would it be the same as per all the calculations already given.

Please forgive me, I did not do science, am not good in maths and am a serious newbie soaper who prefers HP.

Help and advice on the above is welcome.

In case no one else answers, I personally would not add SL to a 100% CO 30%SF recipe. CO gets very hard on it's own, and unmolds very easily within less than a day for CP, and within hours for HP. So my advice would be to leave out the SL altogether.

 

[Althea]

In case no one else answers, I personally would not add SL to a 100% CO 30%SF recipe. CO gets very hard on it's own, and unmolds very easily within less than a day for CP, and within hours for HP. So my advice would be to leave out the SL altogether.

The recipe requires the SL as it is a SBHP Soap Recipe it is not as much for the hardening of the soap but more to spread up saponification and to assist with liquidity to mold and swirl.

 

[AliOop]

Ahhh, I see. I do HTFHP, so I'm all about it. I personally like the effects of SL but hate spending money to special order stuff that isn't already in my kitchen. You could use a different trace accelerant, including a few shreds of finished soap, or a 2-3 drops of cinnamon EO. My skin is super sensitive to cinnamon EO, but at 2 drops per 3lb batch, I don't get any reaction at all. And it definitely accelerates the batter. Although you don't need sugar for lather in a 100% CO soap, it does heat the batter, and heat also speeds up acceleration.

Just a few options to consider.

 

[Sharon Borninkhof]

When you use vinegar to replace some or all of your water, the acetic acid in the vinegar reacts with sodium hydroxide to form sodium acetate. Sodium acetate works like sodium lactate to harden your soap, except all you have to buy is vinegar.

I promised simpler instructions for folks who don't want to get so exacting with the math. I have done this technique with white vinegar, but the instructions will work with any vinegar that contains 5% acetic acid.

First decide how much sodium acetate you want in the soap. Try maybe 1 or 2% of the oil amount for your first time out. Lets say 2% for the example.

Multiply your oil amount by the percentage you chose:
2% of 500 g oil is 500 x .02 = 10 g sodium acetate (SA) desired

Multiply the SA amount by 14.6 for the amount of water to replace with vinegar:
10 * 14.6 = 146 g vinegar

Multiply the SA amount by .49 for the amount of extra NaOH to add to what your lye calculator told you:
10 x .49 = 4.9 g extra NaOH

That's all there is to it.

If you happen to want to replace ALL your water with vinegar, multiply your liquid amount by .0333 to get the amount of extra NaOH to add.

The more exacting explanation of the math, for those who want it, is here:

http://www.soapmakingforum.com/showthread.php?t=57991

How does the saponification happen when you mix vinegar (an acid) and NaOH (an alcaline) together?

 

[Lin19687]

7a) "I recently came across a much older thread on the forum that contained some info that really helped me out, and so I responded to it with a 'thanks!'", or.....

7b ) "I recently came across a much older thread that left me curious about a few things, and so I posted to it in order to ask a question.", or....

7c) "I recently came accross a much older thread that inquired about a certain subject that I happen to know a little something about, and so I posted to it in order to contribute my 2-cents." .......

Why such negative responses to the above from some of our members?

In a word: necroposting (a combination of "necro" = dead, and posting), i.e., urban slang for posting to a thread that has been dead for some time.

If one does an internet search on necroposting, one will quickly discover that the practice is generally frowned upon and even outright banned on many forums, although there are some forums that tolerate it......up to a point. SMF does not have an official rule that outright bans necroposting (we tolerate it up to a certain point), but because it can oftentimes be a bone of contention amongst some of the more established members of our community, most especially when one's necrocropost is a rather frivolous one, and/or does not add any new, useful/helpful information to the discussion in old thread, we've put together some guidelines that will help you decide whether tis better to necropost and risk the potential ire of the community, or to refrain and just hit the 'Like" button instead, or to start an entirely new thread with a link pointing to the old thread:

-Guideline in regards to statement '7a' from above (necroposting to merely add a 'thanks'): Definitely not worth the ire. 'Tis much better to click on the 'Like' button than to necropost on an old thread just to say 'Thanks!" or "Cool idea!" or other such similar things that don't add anything useful to the discussion ........especially since many see this type of necroposting as nothing more than a ploy to boost one's post count.

-Guideline in regards to statement '7b' from above (necroposting to ask a question): More than likely not worth the ire. 'Tis much better to start a new thread in which to pose your question (with a link pointing to the old thread), than it is to necropost in the old thread, because new questions posed on old threads oftentimes fail to generate a response, especially if the original OP and/or respondents are no longer active on the board. Besides that, there's also a good chance that your question may fail to generate a response because new questions posed on old threads oftentimes get lost in the shuffle due to people mistaking the old thread for a brand new thread. What happens in that case is that the people who open up the thread (who mistakenly think that it is a new thread) will read only so far as the OP's question in post #1 and respond to that, without ever seeing your question that was posted further along, which will result in your question becoming buried in the mix where it is even harder to see.

Necroposting to ask a question can also cause a bit of troublesome confusion and possibly even danger for newer members depending on how old the thread is when the new question bumps the thread back up to the front page, because many of the old posts in the thread may contain outdated/abandoned advice no longer espoused by the original poster(s) to the thread, and/or practices no longer deemed necessary or safe...... but because the thread is back on the front page, it is often mistaken by newcomers as being a current thread filled with current, up-to-date good info and advice, when the very opposite may actually be the case.

Last but not least, there are a number of our members who have gone on record with the statement that they take a dim view of necroposting, and purposefully refuse to open threads that have been resurrected by a necropost.

-Guideline in regards to statement '7c' from above (necroposting to add a new bit of helpful wisdom): This is one of the times where a necropost might be worth the risk of attracting any potential ire, depending on the level of helpfulness, accuracy, and/or relevance of your words of wisdom. If you are ever in doubt, though, as to whether you should necropost your words of wisdom in the old thread, or rather introduce them in a new thread with a link pointing to the old thread, just let it be said that no one will ever fault you for doing the latter of the two.

 

[Jennifer Horne]

SL is liquid salt, wouldnt salt do the same thing? I dont know much about HP yet but i use salt for my CP instead of SL

 

[cmzaha]

I need to replace SL in a HP 100% Coconut Oil soap recipe with a 30% SF as an additive (after Trace) at 3% PPO. We don't get SL where I live so need to substitute it. Would it be the same as per all the calculations already given.

Please forgive me, I did not do science, am not good in maths and am a serious newbie soaper who prefers HP.

Help and advice on the above is welcome.

First off this is an old post and you would be better off creating a new thread with your question.
Also, this is a thread about using vinegar for creating a harder bar of soap. So, if you are trying to replace SL in HP to create a more liquid pour vinegar is not a good replacement. You might try some sugar water instead.

How does the saponification happen when you mix vinegar (an acid) and NaOH (an alcaline) together?

Vinegar does not affect saponification. What it does is react with the lye to create sodium acetate which will act similar to sodium lactate to help harden your soap. This will only happen when extra NaOH at the rate of 0.0357 is added. I only list NaOH since that is what we use for bar soap. If the extra lye is not added the vinegar will result in added superfat because it will still react with the lye leaving extra fat in the soap. You can read about it here. https://classicbells.com/soap/aceticAcid.asp