Lye crystals forming on soap as it cures?

[fillycate]

OK, so I made my first batch. It was a goatmilk, honey, oatmeal recipe. I admit, I didn't follow the recipe perfectly. First, I didn't have enough of the kind of animal fat it called for, so I used what I had on hand until it was enough (beef, goat, chicken--is chicken OK?) Also, it called for liquid goat milk, and I had frozen cubes of goat milk.

I don't think the mixture ever got hot, really. It certainly didn't turn orange or anything like that. But it seemed to gel up just fine. The recipe said to use a hand mixer for quite a long time, so it got lots of blending time.

When I went to cut it, there was a fair amount of oil that had seeped out on all sides, and I could see pockets of it where bits of oatmeal were. I just wiped them and cut. The consistency seemed pretty soap-like, so I was all excited that I had succeeded and I just needed to wait.

But as time passed, tiny white crystals began forming on the outside, especially on the top. When I happened to touch them with my skin, my skin tingled, which I figured meant they were crystals of lye.

So, the problem could be several different things. I was wondering if anyone knew the cause of lye crystals on the bars and if the bars can be salvaged or if I should just try to use them to make buckskin leather.

 

[7053joanne]

The only time I had white crystals was when I hadn't let the lye completely dissolve into the water. I ended up tossing the batch. If it's savable someone will speak up. Good luck!

 

[SimplyE]

or if I should just try to use them to make buckskin leather.

:shock: LOL!

Did you adjust your lye calculation with the change in animal fat? I have not used much animal fat and don't know if they are interchangable, but when changing fats/oil, normally you would have to rerun your calculation. Could be that you used too much lye.

 

[ewenique]

Yep, the last batch I made is doing the same thing - lye crystals popping up and some are leaking. When making the soap, I didn't realize that the lye wasn't totally dissolved until I was pouring it into the oils but went ahead thinking that all the stickblending would finish dissolving the lye. So, can this soap be rebatched - either as is, or by cutting out the lye spots first?

 

[Norai]

I've read that chicken fat doesn't do very well, that it makes soap really soft. The others should be fine in general though as long as you check on them with a lye calculator.

 

[fillycate]

Good to know about chicken fat and soft soap. I had read that beef tallow makes it very hard, so maybe they cancel each other out. The amount of animal fat was the same as what my recipe called for, it just called for only one kind and I put in three. The amounts I put in were the same as the recipe, but the goat milk was frozen.

I would like to rebatch it, but I worry that if there is too much lye, it would just crystalize again. Also, would it need to be re-cured since the lye crystals that are in there didn't bond with the other materials in the soap?

I am quite serious about the buckskins. It is just another thing on my very long to-do list.

 

[ewenique]

I rebatched my lye leaky soap by boiling in a baggie. We'll see how it turns out, but I'm hoping that the lye problem was taken care of.

If yours seems to be lye heavy due to incorrect measurement, I wonder if adding some extra oil (maybe coconut) would absorb the excess lye during the rebatch process. I'm just a newbie, too, so hopefully others with more experience will chime in.

 

[fillycate]

I edited my post above to explain that all the amounts I put in were correct (same amount of fat, just different kinds, goat milk frozen instead of liquid). But after the oil separated in the first 24 hours, I imagine the lye was out of balance with the rest of the stuff.

So maybe if I rebatch with some more oil added in it might work out well?