I wrote an epic first post for you to read :)

[Boudicea]

Hi,
I'm completely new here and I'm also new to soap making. I'm a graduate student in biochemistry, although my project is really more about genomics. I'm also an avid horseback rider. And I have two Siamese cats. I love animals. I live in New England, in the countryside.

I've recently had a great failure with my first batch of soap. It all started out back in early August of this year. I got the recipe from a little book just called Soap by Tatyana Hill. It said to first make a batch of cold process soap:

615g coconut oil
670g sunflower oil
670g olive oil
295g lye
930mL mineral water

Unfortunately, I had bought the ingredients for this a long time before I actually got around to making it and I didn't remember that I needed to buy more of some of them. So I ran out of some of the oils like the coconut and sunflower oil. So I substituted with I believe vegetable oil.

The soap never really seemed to trace despite my best efforts and lots of patience so I finally gave up and poured it into the mold anyway. And it did harden and turn into something that looked like real soap.

It cut it into big bars and there it say for many months. Actually until Sunday night when I decided to do something with it. It was quite hard by then but when I started grating it up to re-melt it, I noticed that it was really bothering my nose and lungs. This soap has been sitting since August, surely that's long enough for the curing process right?

Undaunted, I decided to go ahead with the recipe anyway. Same book and everything:

800g grated soap
320mL mineral water50g powdered green algae
70g bladderwrack
50g Iceland moss
juice of one lemon
15g bergamot oil (is there any particular reason soap people don't believe in volumetric measurements of liquids?!)
20g patchouli oil
1tsp lime oil (I guess for this volume is acceptable?)

So I melted the soap until the string phase in a double boiler. I added the supplements according to the recipe. It turned into a giant green mess. ok.

Poured it into a PVC tube (yes I can watch youtube videos!) and then crossed my fingers.

Next day. I took it out and under the bergamot smell that caustic smell was still there. But now it looked like that foam padding you put under carpeting. It's green and white and well just ugly. Not at all like the picture in the book.

My main concern is what's with the caustic problem? I still have quite a lot of the shredded soap. Is there something I can do to fix this during the re-melting process? Or should I scrap it and start over?

 

[dagmar88]

I suppose you didn't recalculate the amount of lye and water you needed when you swapped both coconut and sunflower oil for 'vegetable' oil.
Aside from the fact you'll never know the definite SAP value of vegetable oil, even when you're in contact with the producer, as it constantly changes you don't know it's make up.

What you should have done was recalculate with the help from a lye calculator such as www.soapcalc.net
The amount you should have used with the recipe above is 279 grams; the recipe was incorrect to begin with, that's why you always double check.
Suppose the vegetable oil is mainly soy and canola the amount of lye would have been around 250 so your soap is very, very lye heavy.
Then you shredded the lye heavy soap and added some ingredients.
I'd rather go work on a basic recipe that does the trick instead of adding all kinds of (expensive) things.

In my opinion, your grated soap is useless and I'd toss it. Would you have known the exact ingredients then you could have calculated the right amount of oils for the lye you used and you could have added those during rebatching.
Although that's a pain in the ... too...



:? Now, tell me, where did your story start being epic? I'm more scared then filled with joy a graduate student in biochemistry can be so careless...

 

[Laurie]

Welcome to the forum. And yes the soap calculator is your best friend.
I would never make soap without it. Having said that I didn't even know it existed the first few years I was making soap and maybe it didn't way back then.

Read this forum and what Dagmar wrote and you will learn why your soap was caustic.

Then make another batch of soap and you will be very pleased. Learning to make soap and all the practice that goes with it is like graduate studies.

 

[Boudicea]

:? Now, tell me, where did your story start being epic? I'm more scared then filled with joy a graduate student in biochemistry can be so careless...

Geez, thanks for the warm welcome. I guess I'll stay away from this form in the future. I didn't know soap people were so snotty.

Thanks for the help. Goodbye.

 

[dagmar88]

I'm sorry, I just can't see what's so great about this 'story' because IMO you could have seriously hurt yourself...

Glad you didn't, but I really hope other people who are just starting out do a little more research.

 

[Boudicea]

I only meant that my post was epic in length, not that it was a great story. I was just hoping to get some help. But I will do so on my own from now on. Thanks anyway.

 

[dagmar88]

and help you didn't get?

 

[Boudicea]

I did say thanks for the help. But it was the attitude of: you're such a moron how could you possibly be so stupid? that was just a little off putting. I never claimed to be very smart and I'm completely new to soap making. I did do my research but it was a while ago before I made this soap.

 

[Acme]

You are probably still reading the responses to your first post so I'll just say Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and good luck with your future soap making Boudicea.

 

[carebear]

We don't make light of safety here - and your storyis a bit scary. I just posted in another thread that soaping is chemistry... So is cooking. In both soaping and cooking, the ratios of some ingredients are very important. And your kitchen or wherever you soap is a lab. In a lab you don't willy nilly with components - you do the math. As a scientist you know that safety comes first. So accept the scolding and responsibility and move on.

Second, as a graduate student you know about how materials differ in densities - this is the reason we use weight instead of volume. Otherwise putting our formulas into %s is a pain in the arse.

My next concern is where you got the recipe. It must have been designed ONLY for rebatching with more saponifiable oil. Even if you'd followed the recipe it could be caustic. Since you didn't, I'm not sure what you have.

Welcome to the wonderful world of chemistry in life. To get a good laymans' understanding of soaping (to which you can then apply your knowledge of chemistry), try millersoap.com. There are many other resources as well.

Good luck with your soaping and your schooling. Maybe the twain can meet.

 

[Boudicea]

Thank you for your help and thanks Acme, for the greeting. Merry Christmas to you, too.

Whatever you think of me, I am a careful worker in the lab and I'm very detail oriented. I take the time to plan everything out first, that is my method. And I did try to plan this soap making out the same way but I think my first mistake was that I planned everything out and then waited too long before I actually made the soap.

I also do not work in a chemical lab. My department is biochemistry but my lab that I worked in (I'm now writing my thesis) was a molecular biology lab and my project is actually on genomic which is done on the computer. I would say my chemistry background is definitely not as strong as my biological one and most of the stuff I did in the lab was very safe. I don't like to play with nasty chemicles but when I do I take the necessary precautions.

I guess my mistake in this case was not understanding the chemistry behind soap making well enough and treating it more like cooking then like chemistry--in that you can often substitute ingredients when you are cooking without consequence or maybe it might even improve the recipe.

I'm a very sensitive person and so usually all it takes to instruct me is to just tell me what I did wrong and what I should do to fix it.

Anyway, I won't be using this book anymore for recipes as all the other recipes are very similar in expensive ingredients and process. I will try to find a more basic one to get me started and I will look at the source you have given me. I do appreciate the help.

 

[soapbuddy]

Welcome!
Go to Miller soap. You can find better recipes there. http://www.millersoap.com/soapallveg.html
I hope you have a good scale and some goggles. Heavy duty plastic pitcher is safe to mix your lye water in.

 

[pixybratt]

welcome and Happy Holidays

 

[rubyslippers]

Welcome to the forum Boudicea. Toss those first 2 batches and consider them learning experiences. You should not be reacting from a foul smell from the soap so that would be an indication it is not safe to use.

I would recommend the millersoap website also and a book I found very informative was Soapmaker's Companion by Susan Cavitch Miller. Also, familarize yourself with soapcalc.net so that you can determine the correct amount of lye in each and every recipe (even ones that are printed in books or on the internet because typos are possible!)

I've been "soaping" for 1-1/2 years and still consider myself a newbie! The old adage "the more you know, the more you know you don't know" is so true to the soaping experience. I amaze (actually scare) myself that I even attempted to make soap with the limited amount of knowledge I had when I began

It is truly a continual learning experience and this site will provide you with many helpful tips and hints.

 

[Boudicea]

Thank you for the welcome and the advice.

I am planning to throw the batches away but I do have a question. My mom wants to use them for stuff like laundry detergent. I told her I thought it was probably a bad idea but what do you say?

Thanks for the links and suggestions for reading. I'll get crackin' on those.

 

[rubyslippers]

... My mom wants to use them for stuff like laundry detergent. I told her I thought it was probably a bad idea but what do you say?

I'd say not a good idea. If it were me, I wouldn't want to risk it.

I have grated up soap & used it for laundry detergent but it was "good" soap, I just didn't like the way it turned out because the scent was one that I didn't like in the finished soap.

 

[carebear]

if it's barely caustic, or not caustic you can use it for laundry IF you have soft water. but it's not ideal.

if you choose to use it, be sure to use vinegar in the rinse cycle.

 

[punkflash54]

hi welcome to the forum. i've been making soap for about 5 years now and i still make mistakes. it sucks having to discard a batch but i'm sure it happens to all of us. you will get better with more practice but on occasion you will end up with a bad batch. This is a great forum, with great people and lots of helpful info. I have been able to get answers to my many questions here and i hope you can do the same. good luck with soap making! its addicting and fun