New recipe very soft

[Red Kev]

Hi All, I've just tried a new recipe and it's been sitting in mould for about a week. I tried to turn one bar out the other day and it's very soft and wouldn't release from the mould in one nice piece.

I am wondering if anyone could hazard a guess as to what's causing it. My first guesses (just because I've not used it before) are the additions of castor oil at 10%, linseed/flaxseed at 5% (though I've not a had problem with linseed before) and Sweet Orange EO at 1%. Temperatures were around 40-C (104-F) though I don't pay that much attention to temps, for both oils and lye solution.

Any thoughts?

Thanks
Sam

 

[Genny]

10% castor oil can make soap very soft.
What's the rest of the recipe?

 

[Hazel]

I use 10% castor in several batches and I don't have a problem unless I have a high olive percentage.

 

[Red Kev]

Hi Genny, full ingredients as follows:

Olive oil 57%
Coconut oil 12%
Castor oil 10%
Flax seed oil 5%
Cocooa butter 5%
Camellia oil 4%
Apricot kernel 5%
Rosemary oil 2%
----------------------------
Added at light trace
Sweet orange EO 1.1%
Olive leaf extract 1.1 %
----------------------------
NaOH 67g (for a 500g batch) = 9.1% (4% lye discount)
Water 158g = 21.3 % (3% water discount)

Cheers
Sam

 

[Lindy]

I must admit I have never used Flax Seed Oil or Camelina so I have no idea how they are going to affect your recipe.

My first thought is that you didn't weigh your oil right or you actually forgot to put the lye in. I would recommend trying it again and measuring everything really carefully. I really like that you are working in grams rather than ounces. One of the things I do when I am working is to check off each item as I measure it out and put it in. That way I can tell with a quick glance if I missed anything.

I'm sorry I just don't know what else to tell you. That should have set up within a couple of days at the longest. I work with high castor oil recipes all the time and some of them are as high as 20%....

 

[Red Kev]

Thanks all. Sounds like I must have done something wrong -- mismeasured or left something out. I'll give it another lash and see what happens.

 

[Cosmo]

I haven't run your recipe through a lye calculator, but a lot of your oils are very soft oils and will result in a soft soap. To make this soap work, I believe you would have to use a stronger lye solution. I make soap high in soft oils and I use a 50/50 solution. Your oils combined with your high water rate will make a very soft soap.

 

[Loolee]

I did run your recipe through soap calc. there is no option to add rosemary oil, so that may have affected it.

but overall, the numbers show this soap to be a very soft bar of soap. that being said, the high percentage of olive oil may change that as olive oil make a very hard bar of soap. but the INS is very low at 116, and the hardness is 24.

something else that i wonder. Are you certain that your oils are all pure, 100% unadulterated oils? I am specifically curious about the camellia oil, the rosemary oil and maybe even the flax oil. Those are not common oils to use and not sure where you even found them, so I would look closely at them.

 

[honor435]

I use 10% castor all the time,( its not that) i just think its all the soft oils, it will harden , eventually. Just curious why all those oils? Start simple.

 

[Red Kev]

I haven't run your recipe through a lye calculator, but a lot of your oils are very soft oils and will result in a soft soap. To make this soap work, I believe you would have to use a stronger lye solution. I make soap high in soft oils and I use a 50/50 solution. Your oils combined with your high water rate will make a very soft soap.

Hi Cosmo, can you explain what you mean by a "50/50" solution? And how can you tell if oils are "soft"? My thinking was the olive oil and coconut would harden things up a bit ...

something else that i wonder. Are you certain that your oils are all pure, 100% unadulterated oils? I am specifically curious about the camellia oil, the rosemary oil and maybe even the flax oil. Those are not common oils to use and not sure where you even found them, so I would look closely at them.

Loolee, all the oils come from various soap making or trade suppliers so I'd be very disappointed and a tad cranky if they're not what they say. That said, it's a good point and I'll get in touch and verify the integrity of these oils. Goodness knows the price tags certainly speak of authenticity.

I use 10% castor all the time,( its not that) i just think its all the soft oils, it will harden , eventually. Just curious why all those oils? Start simple.

Point taken. It was supposed to be a 'mature-friendly' soap for mum. Camellia oil is rich in Vitamins A, B & E, high in oleic acid and has anti-oxidant properties. Flaxseed is high in Vit E and has anti-oxidant properties. Coconut for its lather, castor oil for its emollient properties. Rosemary oil is said to reduce the appearance of broken veins and capillaries. Cocoa butter is said to diminish wrinkles. Mum should look a million bucks ...

 

[Red Kev]

Thought I'd revisit this thread as I did a bit of experimenting yesterday.

To return to the topic, this soap was very soft when I first made it. Even after a couple of weeks in the mould, the individual bars would not demould cleanly; instead, the mixture would cling to the bottom of the mould and was still very fudgey. The best way I can describe it is it was like a thick ganache or thick frosting. The soaps were hard on top, though. The moulds I am using are a 3 x 4 silicon moulds, each individual mould is about 2.75 inches square and about 1.25 inches deep: this yields a largish bar of about 130 grams.

So I did a bit of reading, and while not finding a specific answer to many questions, I did feel inspired to experiment a bit. (I should say that I have tried another batch between then and now simply fiddling with the quantity of castor oil, as this is not an oil I'd used previously, but it didn't same to make any difference ... )

So, anyway... yesterday ...

The variable I wanted to test was heat. I've haven't paid much attention to heat previously because, (a) a few of the books I have don't seem to pay it much heed and (b) we're in the middle of spring here with avg daytime temps around 26*C and night temps rarely below 18*C. So it's pretty warm. The "shed" we soap in is well insulated (it's mother-in-law's sometime granny flat) and stays pretty cosy.

The thought I was having regarding the softness of this soap is that there is not enough heat for the saponificaction reaction to continue after trace and pour. That is, it's cooling too quickly once in the mould and the reaction is stopping. So I thought:

(1) Make a bigger batch. My test batches are around 500 grams. A bigger batch should help the reaction continue simply through thermal mass. Some of the ingredients are quite pricey, so I didn't want to make too big a batch, so I decided on around 1.5 kg (about 3.3 pounds).
(2) Use a bigger loaf-style mould. More mass in-mould should retain more heat and help the reaction continue. I chose a 1-litre milk carton, which is about 3 inches square and about 8 inches high.
(3) Use a heat source to keep the mix warm in-mould for a while after the pour. I still wanted to use our silicon tray moulds, so I put a mould tray on a flat heat pad I have for brewing beer which, at least as far as beer is concerned, keeps it at about 30*C during fermentation. I poured a separate few bars in another tray mould to stick in the oven at 60* ala Scientific Soapmaking.
(4) Combine the lye and oils at higher initial temps. Typically I've been letting temps cool to about 35*C before combining ...

So what were the results?

I heated the oils and combined the lye and heated oils when both were around 70*C (158*F).
I haven't timed this, so I am scratching the edges of memory, but I reckon it came to trace quicker than previous, smaller (500 gram) batches.
The consistency of the soap at pour was somehow different. Can't put my finger on it, but it seemed creamier or something...

I poured roughly 800 ml (about 27 fl oz) into the makeshift milk/loaf mould;
I divided the remainder into two two silicon tray moulds, one destined for the heat pad, one destined for the oven. Each tray ended up with four individual soaps.
I left the tray mould on the heat pad for 4 hours.
I left the other tray mould in the oven for about 30 mins...

Okay, so ...

First, the oven option was a total disaster. Enough said about that.

The soaps-in-silicon on the heat pad seem to have hardened up nicely, and I demoulded a single bar this morning. It can do with some more time in-mould (patience isn't one of my many, many virtues ), but so far this is very promising.

The soap in the milk/loaf mould I will need to leave longer to cure, though it seems hardish to the touch.

One thing I noticed during the initial in-mould stage is that both the soap on the heat pad and the soap in the milk/loaf mould went through an initial hardening off stage, then softened up again so that they yielded to finger pressure on top, and they appeared noticeably translucent in the centre.

I've only been soaping for six months or so, so I don't have a whole lot of experience and results under my belt, but this translucent stage is not something I've seen in any of my other soaps. Which raises the question: Is this a stage that should be showing with my other soaps?


Anyone like to comment on my method or results? Interested to know if any of this rings true with more experienced or experimental soapers.

 

[Hazel]

One thing I noticed during the initial in-mould stage is that both the soap on the heat pad and the soap in the milk/loaf mould went through an initial hardening off stage, then softened up again so that they yielded to finger pressure on top, and they appeared noticeably translucent in the centre.

I've only been soaping for six months or so, so I don't have a whole lot of experience and results under my belt, but this translucent stage is not something I've seen in any of my other soaps. Which raises the question: Is this a stage that should be showing with my other soaps?

What you're describing sounds like gelling to me. Soap does become translucent as the soap heats up during saponification.

Scroll down a bit and you'll see a loaf that is starting to gel. http://blog.thesage.com/2010/08/20/grap ... ckey-soap/

Here's a link to a post about partial gel by judymoody. Her soap is a good example of a loaf that gelled in the center but there wasn't enough heat so the outer section remained ungelled. viewtopic.php?t=28860

You don't have to gel your batches. Ungelled soap will saponify but it just takes longer - generally several days. I had one batch that took about 5 or 6 days before it was fully saponified. There's been several discussions about gelling vs not gelling. Here's a link to one of them. viewtopic.php?t=29066


Making a larger batch sounded good to me since smaller batches tend to lose heat more rapidly. Are you covering your molds with a towel or blanket to help hold heat?

I've found it helps to warm my silicone molds in the oven before I pour the soap into it. The warmth of the mold and using a higher temp (120F maybe?) almost always ensures a full gel.

Why was the oven batch a disaster?

 

[Red Kev]

Thank you, Hazel, for you suggestions and experience.

So it has been six days since the last experimental pour. Here are the results. All of these soaps (except the very last) were made to the same recipe, and oils and lye combined at 70*C:

The oven soap kind of exploded: not in a Mythbusters type way, it just expanded (pretty quickly, it was only in the oven for 30-odd minutes), oozed out over the top of the mould, and then I pulled it out.

Soap in oven at 60* for about 30 minutes (or until I noticed things were not going to plan). Left in mould six days. Interesting, no?

The soap hereunder was placed on a wire rack, about 5cm (2 inches) above a flat heat pad, and the whole assembly was covered in a foil-lined cover and incubated for four hours.

Incubated soap. Left in mould six days. Sorry, the images aren't great. Reliance on an iPhone for photography ...
This first image is the soap, just turned out 30 mins ago, and is upside down, i.e. that rippled texture is the bottom of the soap. So it's still grabbing the walls and bottom of the mould when trying to demould. You can see in the still-in-mould picture the uneven texture on the top of the soap which is a result of this batch gelling and then resetting. Or what I assume to be a gel stage :wink:

The holey texture is something I can't explain (Anyone? Bueller?), but the previous attempt at this soap that was incubated turned out the same. It doesn't seem to happen if this soap is not incubated. Thoughts?

And this is the soap that was simply poured and left to set. (The fingerprints are courtesy of a little imp called Impatience.) It is still grabbing slightly on demoulding so one has to take it quite slowly and carefully, but it has certainly come out the cleanest. It seems to me that the silicone, being such a tight seal/mould by its nature, is not letting the soap breathe so the soap is sweating in place. I guess this is in part why it's good to get it out of the mould and let harden off on racks. But even though this version is looking promising, the care needed with the demoulding process is not ideal. Should it harden up more if left in-mould for a further week or two?

And finally, here is the initial pour of this recipe, five weeks later, still spongy. You can see from the "whipped peaks" how gooey it was when first demoulded. It is hardening up to a degree, but it's still a bit spongy and soft.

Thoughts? Comments? It doesn't seem to me that the heating post-pour and incubation is doing it any favours, and is not leading to a quicker or harder setup time.

I'm thinking that the unincubated version (2nd set of pics) is the one to pursue, and either needs to be left in the mould for longer to harden up a bit more, or I need to fiddle the recipe to add some more, say, coconut, or some bees wax, or adjust the NaOH to less superfatting (it's currently at 4% lye discount, and I didn't want to go under that, really: being a noob at all this, that's my margin for error, as I see it).

Thanks all,
Sam

 

[ClaraSuds]

Your oven batch just got too hot, how high did you heat the oven? I usually put my oven on the lowest temp for 10 mins which heats it only to about 50 degrees celcius and that's a perfect temp for gelling a soap without overheating it. I think all of your batches will be fine given time. You've got a lot of olive in them and that will harden. OK the volcano soaps will look a little interesting but there won't be anything wrong with them in terms of usage.

Here's what I would do with these batches. Test all of them for zap and if they are all ok I'd grate up the oven soaps and break up the super soft ones in a bowl. Then I'd remould those by hand into soap balls of a nice comfortable size and leave them to cure until they are nice and hard. You could even grind up a little bit of orange peel of rosemary herb fine and add a little bit to the soap balls for visual interest and scrubbyness.

Overall your recipe is only 17% hard oils which I think accounts for the softness of them combined with the high castor. I would be inclined to bump the hard oil content up to at least 25% for a faster setting bar. I'd remove the flax seed and camellia oil completely and increase the coconut oil to 15% and cocoa butter to 11%. Camellia is so similar to olive oil that it doesn't make much difference and flax seed is an oil without a long shelf life. Given that your recipe needs a longer curing time I would remove this in order to minimise the risk of DOS developing.

 

[Hazel]

I agree the main problem is the recipe as the other people already mentioned. I calculated 24% content of saturated fats in the recipe. Yes, eventually olive oil will cure very hard but eventually is the operative word. It takes a lot longer to get hard and the other soft oils contribute very little to hardness. But as honor435 stated, it will eventually get hard but it's going to take awhile. You're just going to have to set it aside and be patient. I think you'd be better off eliminating the camellia, flax and apricot kernel and reformulating the recipe. You do not need to lower the SF. The superfat doesn't have anything to do with the softness. I suggest using a higher SF - maybe about 8%. I have dry, mature skin and I've found soap with higher SF a little kinder on my skin.

I'd like to suggest trying the recipe below with an 8% SF.

60% Olive
20% Coconut
10% Cocoa Butter
10% Castor

It may be a little soft to start but will cure hard in a few months. You can also add about 2%-3% sodium lactate to help with initial hardness and make it easier to unmold. I like adding about 4% sugar ppo which I dissolve in some of the liquid before adding it to the batch.

I think the camellia, flax and apricot with the rosemary oil would be more beneficial in a lotion or serum than in soap. Nobody is really sure how much of the beneficial properties of oils make it through saponification.

The oven soap kind of exploded: not in a Mythbusters type way, it just expanded (pretty quickly, it was only in the oven for 30-odd minutes), oozed out over the top of the mould, and then I pulled it out.

Basically, you just saw a volcano occur. Am I understanding correctly you put the soap in and left the heat on? I've only tried CPOP twice. The first time I left the oven on, checked and saw the soap getting a bit bubbly (overheating) so I quickly took it out. The second time I heated the oven up to approximately 170F/77C, turned the heat off and then put the soap in the oven. It worked out better, IMO.

Was the holey soap the one you put in the oven which overheated? If so, I'd say as it started to volcano and when it collapsed allowed some air into the batch. I think it might be air pockets but I'm not positive. But usually when I see holes in my batches, they have occurred when I've poured at thick trace and didn't bang the mold down hard enough to release air pockets.

I just noticed ClaraSuds already posted awhile back. That's what I get for starting a post, then wandering off and coming back later to finish it.

 

[Lindy]

There is another possibility here and that is your lye. Is it 100% lye and is it lumpy? If it is lumpy then you're not getting an accurate measurement because it contains water hence the lumps. I just find it so weird that the soap is behaving like this. Maybe buy some more lye and see if you can get a better result.

 

[Kansas Farm Girl]

I have found that the KISS (Keep It Simple Soaper) method works best, at least for me. When I work up a recipe that is going to solve every skin problem I have and I look at the number of different oils I have added and the small %'s of each I remind myself of this principle and cut back to basics like Hazel's recipe has done. I have found that those are the ones that I end up liking and going back to. I agree with the idea of putting the more exotic oils into a lotion or lotion bar so that they will stay on the skin to impart those desired characteristics and not wash right down the drain.

 

[Red Kev]

Thank you, all, for your valued opinions and suggestions. Enough of flogging a lame horse, so to speak; I'll re-evaluate the ingredients and quantities in line with your comments and recast the recipe entirely.

Lindy, the lye dissolves fine and doesn't seem to cause any problems with other soaps. I agree: it's weird.

I have found coconut in quantities more than about 15% to feel quite drying, which is why I've kept it down: more for its lather than its hardness. But that's only my experience from only a few recipes so not much of a sample population, so perhaps I need to give it another chance. I don't use palm oil at all, nor tallow or lard (for my own reasons, which I won't press on others). So I am kind of limited in my range of hard oils. But, Hazel, I'll give your suggestion a go

Kansas farm girl: can you point me in the direction of a starter recipe or other info for your suggested "lotion bar": I'm intrigued.

Thanks again, much appreciated all. Will post results when reformulated and results are known.
Sam

 

[ClaraSuds]

Try adding stearic acid or more vegetable butters to increase the hardness without drying.

 

[Hazel]

I have found coconut in quantities more than about 15% to feel quite drying, which is why I've kept it down: more for its lather than its hardness. But that's only my experience from only a few recipes so not much of a sample population, so perhaps I need to give it another chance.

Increasing the superfat helps to alleviate the drying effect of CO. If it bothers you a lot, try raising the SF to 10% since Kevin Dunn proved a higher SF doesn't contribute to DOS.

That is a really good suggestion from Kansas Farm Girl to make a lotion bar. You can use equal parts of beeswax, butter and a soft oil to create a lotion bar or massage bar as some people call them. That's just a starting point. I made some and didn't like how hard they were so the next time I decreased the beeswax percentage and increased the other two ingredients proportionally. There have been discussions about lotion bars on the forum but the link below gives an example of a recipe.

viewtopic.php?t=22244

You can also check out some tutorials.

http://www.crunchybetty.com/how-to-make-lotion-bars
http://www.soap-making-resource.com/lot ... ecipe.html