My Lye water froze??

[Holly8991]

i just had the weirdest thing happen. I put my lye water in an ice bath like i do all the time but this time it froze? Has this ever happened to anyone? What did I do wrong?
So i have it in a hot bath now and it looks like a gooey melty plastic!

 

[steffamarie]

I'm definitely not the authority on this, but I would think it would be just fine when thawed...if you can use ice/frozen milks/etc to make lye water, I would imagine it would take a lot to degrade the solution.

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

I'm definitely not the authority on this, but I would think it would be just fine when thawed...if you can use ice/frozen milks/etc to make lye water, I would imagine it would take a lot to degrade the solution.

The difference there is that the reaction of the solid NaOH with the frozen milk melts the milk to a liquid. The actual solution itself isn't frozen.

As to this frozen solution, though, if there are no solid bit at all, I can't see it being as issue. There is still the same amount of liquid in there, it's not like boiling where some would evaporate off.

 

[cmzaha]

I am not really sure but here is a link to check out . I know I got lye to cold once trying to make whipped floating soap and the soap failed completely, which I am sure was due to to cold temps
https://www.soapmakingforum.com/thr...ture-reccomendations.61099/page-2#post-700411

 

[psfred]

How much water and how much lye? If you were close to 1:1, it's possible that the lye dissolved and then crystalized back out ('froze') when it cooled off.

 

[Holly8991]

It was 4.2 water and 4 lye so that was it. Thank you! I tossed it and started again. This time with not ice bath and it worked perfectly. I am trying to incorporate some goat milk so i discounted the water.

 

[soap1daze]

I would suggest not putting your lye solution into a ice water bath until it is thoroughly dissolved. I once got my solution too cold and heated it up a bit in the micro wave 10 seconds at a time.

 

[DeeAnna]

A 50% NaOH solution will become very thick if it cools below 60 F (15 C). Just warm it up again and it will be fine -- you didn't need to discard the mixture. Although Soap1daze makes a good point -- solid NaOH won't dissolve well in really cold water, especially if you're trying to make a high lye concentration.

 

[Holly8991]

How to warm it up? I was afraid to try anything.

 

[DeeAnna]

Well, you can just let it sit out at room temperature. That would work if you're afraid to do more. Or you could fill a bowl with hot water and sit the container of lye solution in the bowl. All it needs to do is warm up to normal room temperature.

 

[Holly8991]

i did the hot water bath and it just turned gooey :-(

 

[DeeAnna]

It may take awhile to fully warm up if it's a 50% NaOH solution. If it doesn't become liquid after some hours, I'm not quite sure what other advise to give.

 

[psfred]

Do NOT add more water to the lye, it's likely to boil and spatter.

Any other additives in the lye can also crystallize out when it cools (EDTA is know for this in high lye concentrations).

Just use a bit more water next time and don't chill it.

 

[DeeAnna]

Do NOT add more water to the lye, it's likely to boil and spatter....

Not sure I am following the reasoning behind your suggestion, given the OP is dealing with NaOH solution, not dry NaOH. I understand why one should never add water to dry NaOH, but why would adding more water to a lye solution cause it to boil and spatter? Warm up, yes, that will happen. But get hot enough to spatter?

I hadn't thought about additives causing the thickening -- good point!

 

[earlene]

I had solid lye rocks in soap under similar conditions when I was new to soapmaking and didn't have a clue what to do when my lye solution froze. Make sure you thaw it thoroughly, then make sure it is completely liquid with NO chunks. Put it through a strainer into another empty container to make sure there are not solid pieces. Then and only then would I consider using a solution that had frozen. I did not do that and the resulting solid rocks of lye in my soap looked like this:

If it has chunks you can't turn into liquid, I'd toss it and start over. Better to lose a little lye and milk than all the oils as well.