Rebatching question

[sakura1024]

I would like to try CP or HP in the future, but just to get my feet wet, I would like to try rebatching first. I have read several people say they add gm when rebatching, but others have said that since it doesn't saponify, that it will go rancid. Is there a diffinitive answer on this?

Also, I would like to add my own oils/butters to the soap base to add extra qualities and to find a combination that works well. Is this possible with rebatching? How do you find out whether an oil is "hard" or "soft" and does this make much difference with rebatching? Any help would be appreciated. I want to make sure I know what I'm doing (to a reasonable extent) before I start ordering supplies and such .

 

[adoptapitbull]

What are you going to rebatch? Do you already have CP/HP soap made from someone else?

 

[Soaplady22]

Hard oils are those that are solid at room temperature - coconut, cocoa butter, palm, etc. Soft oils are liquid - olive, rice bran, castor, etc.

Sounds like you are rebatching some M&P soap if it's already made and you want to add good oils to it. The going rate for adding cocoa butter, for example, to M&P is 1 Tblsp. per pound soap otherwise the bar will not lather as well. Or at all.

 

[sakura1024]

I haven't purchased anything yet because I wasn't sure. I have found a supplier of basic and gm CP soap base, though. They have several types (like shea butter and cocoa butter) that just don't have any extra additives so that you can hand mill them with your own extras.

 

[sakura1024]

I guess what I'm looking at is M&P... here's the link: http://www.etsy.com/listing/69400924/10 ... e-melt-and

 

[carebear]

I guess what I'm looking at is M&P... here's the link: http://www.etsy.com/listing/69400924/10 ... e-melt-and

Yea. The name kinda gives it away.

 

[carebear]

Bramble Berry and some others sell CP soap for rebatching. http://www.brambleberry.com/Rebatch-Bases-C14.aspx

http://www.snowdriftfarm.com/rebatch.html

you call it hand milling - which makes it sound like the triple milled french soaps and such, but it's more typically among soapers referred to rebatching. rebatching means heating to make it mushy and maybe smooshing in other stuff and then molding and letting harden.

 

[calico21]

While melt and pour is fun and can be quite beautiful, don't judge your experience with it as a basis for cp soaping as they are quite different.

 

[sakura1024]

I guess what I'm looking at is M&P... here's the link: http://www.etsy.com/listing/69400924/10 ... e-melt-and

Yea. The name kinda gives it away.

Haha... yeah... I didn't read all the way to the end. I will definitely check out the other suppliers! I want a product that will be as close to what I ultimately intend to produce. This is just to get my feet wet. The more I learn, the more I like HP soaping. I like that at the end of the cook, all the lye is gone and nonreactive - and it will stop eating up all my oils and cooking my EOs . I'm nervous about having such a small space in which to work with two small girls who refuse to leave me alone when I'm in the kitchen, regardless of the dangers. And I can't exactly shoo them out when I'm stirring the lye solution, right? lol. I just want to try and find some combinations of oils/butters and EOs that smell nice, make a good soap and last for a while without problems.

 

[carebear]

I guess what I'm looking at is M&P... here's the link: http://www.etsy.com/listing/69400924/10 ... e-melt-and

Yea. The name kinda gives it away.

Haha... yeah... I didn't read all the way to the end. I will definitely check out the other suppliers! I want a product that will be as close to what I ultimately intend to produce. This is just to get my feet wet. The more I learn, the more I like HP soaping. I like that at the end of the cook, all the lye is gone and nonreactive - and it will stop eating up all my oils and cooking my EOs . I'm nervous about having such a small space in which to work with two small girls who refuse to leave me alone when I'm in the kitchen, regardless of the dangers. And I can't exactly shoo them out when I'm stirring the lye solution, right? lol. I just want to try and find some combinations of oils/butters and EOs that smell nice, make a good soap and last for a while without problems.

HP soaping takes MORE interactive time, IME, than CP. With CP you mix and pour and it all happens without you. With HP you mix, and cook, and then pour and you are with it every step of the way. You need to stir the lye solution in either case.

Even finished soap isn't precisely inert - fatty acids still swap themselves around, so your butters may not end up being precisely what's left outside of the soap. And you need to mix your fragrance materials in while the soap is still fluid which means it's hot...

I suggest you try both, when your children are away, and then choose. Neither is safe to do around a child or a pet that can get to you. Seriously.

 

[sakura1024]

Oh I know it! Especially considering they are MY children, and I was the idiot in Chemistry who stuck her nose up to the beaker of Hydrochloric acid to figure out if it was water! If an accident CAN happen, it WILL happen to me! Or stupid mistakes... Hence the over preparing