Scenting Percentages when leaving portion of batter unscented

[Megan]

I usually scent at 5% of my oil weight. I am wondering, however, if I leave a portion of my batter unscented (like to compensate for a discoloring fragrance, or for piping), should I calculate percentage based on the scented portion only, or can I calculate for the total batch oil weight? I am wondering about this especially for certain fragrances that have lower max use percentages (which I tend to avoid for this reason).

 

[DeeAnna]

You can calculate based on the total batch weight and you may be able to put that amount of scent into just part of the soap. I say maybe, because there's a practical limit to the amount of scent that a soap can hold.

I've found (the hard way, of course!) that if the fragrance goes much above 8% in any part of the soap, some of that abundance of FO or EO is likely to weep out even months after the soap is made. I've tried this on several batches with weepy results each time. (I guess I'm overly optimistic sometimes! Or just a slow learner.)

You might be able to push the dosage rate to 10% and get away with it, but I don't. Anymore, I'd rather have a decently scented soap that doesn't have weepy spots than a strongly scented soap that weeps.

 

[Megan]

You can calculate based on the total batch weight and you may be able to put that amount of scent into just part of the soap. I say maybe, because there's a practical limit to the amount of scent that a soap can hold.

I've found (the hard way, of course!) that if the fragrance goes much above 8% in any part of the soap, some of that abundance of FO or EO is likely to weep out even months after the soap is made. I've tried this on several batches with weepy results each time. (I guess I'm overly optimistic sometimes! Or just a slow learner.)

You might be able to push the dosage rate to 10% and get away with it, but I don't. Anymore, I'd rather have a decently scented soap that doesn't have weepy spots than a strongly scented soap that weeps.

Thank you so much for your reply. I do not push it much higher than normal as it is. Last night I decided to try scenting my piped top for the first time, and although I managed to get it on top of the soap, it was much harder to work with than I would have liked. I would much rather just go to 6% for the base rather than try that again!

 

[DeeAnna]

I can appreciate that! I hope my thoughts give you some ideas about scenting your soap. I'm sure the safest way would be to just scent the base soap. If you have a well-behaved scent that pairs well with your "naughty" scent, you could put Nice in the piping and Naughty in the base and get a scent blend that way.

 

[NsMar42111]

I've found (the hard way, of course!) that if the fragrance goes much above 8% in any part of the soap, some of that abundance of FO or EO is likely to weep out even months after the soap is made. I've tried this on several batches with weepy results each time. (I guess I'm overly optimistic sometimes! Or just a slow learner.)

You might be able to push the dosage rate to 10% and get away with it, but I don't. Anymore, I'd rather have a decently scented soap that doesn't have weepy spots than a strongly scented soap that weeps.

Oooo, you may have solved some issues I've had in the past with trying to split batches up! Thinking, yea, the scented part would be at 10% and yea it did weep...ok mystery solved!

 

[Alfa_Lazcares]

The same happened to me a week ago. I usually split the fragrance since they accelerate so i use the unscented one for the top. I did the same but my batch was 200 grams smaller tha n it usually is and i divided it in halves, it did weep but it seems it stoped by now.

 

[soapmaker]

The other thing to consider is that too much f.o. in a smaller amount of soap can cause it to set up before you can get your design done.