Jackofhearts
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Oct 26, 2014
- Messages
- 46
- Reaction score
- 19
DeeAnna! I love your posts! Always informative and always interesting! I was pretty sure that I had some of that wrong especially about the molecular length. It always seemed to me that it would be determined by the fatty acids themselves. Thank you for clearing that up.
To get very specific about what I mean by slickness, most soaps if you load a lot and keep the consistency thick or yogurt-y you end up with a lot of "cushion" but less slickness (in general). After the blade comes by the soap residue feels gone or even a bit tacky. However if you add more water you are left with a thinner slicker but less cushion-y lather. Balancing these 2 dichotomies is mostly about the preference of the shaver. I, for example, tend to prefer extra slickness when I shave my head (particularly the back) yet when I shave my face I tend to go for more cushion. To be sure there are some soaps that straddle the line of cushion and slickness but what I think is really going on is that there is a balance or sweet spot to when they have the desired amount for both cushion and slickness. Some soaps have a wider sweet spot than others and I guess I'm looking to widen the sweet spot of mine.
All this to say, I was hoping that using NaOH in some amount would up the slickness a bit without sacrificing the cushion afforded by the stearic acid and the ease of loading/lathering that KOH brings to the party.
I also in between my post yesterday and this evening realized that well... It's 17 degrees out tonight and the heat is kicking on a lot which dries out the air quite a bit. This would explain why the lather often (toward the end of the pass) would feel drier and therefore less slick than the lather was when I whipped it up to begin with.
To get very specific about what I mean by slickness, most soaps if you load a lot and keep the consistency thick or yogurt-y you end up with a lot of "cushion" but less slickness (in general). After the blade comes by the soap residue feels gone or even a bit tacky. However if you add more water you are left with a thinner slicker but less cushion-y lather. Balancing these 2 dichotomies is mostly about the preference of the shaver. I, for example, tend to prefer extra slickness when I shave my head (particularly the back) yet when I shave my face I tend to go for more cushion. To be sure there are some soaps that straddle the line of cushion and slickness but what I think is really going on is that there is a balance or sweet spot to when they have the desired amount for both cushion and slickness. Some soaps have a wider sweet spot than others and I guess I'm looking to widen the sweet spot of mine.
All this to say, I was hoping that using NaOH in some amount would up the slickness a bit without sacrificing the cushion afforded by the stearic acid and the ease of loading/lathering that KOH brings to the party.
I also in between my post yesterday and this evening realized that well... It's 17 degrees out tonight and the heat is kicking on a lot which dries out the air quite a bit. This would explain why the lather often (toward the end of the pass) would feel drier and therefore less slick than the lather was when I whipped it up to begin with.