So annoyed with myself

[LynetteO]

pardon my inexperience, you can use lye from the fridge or room temp and make soap? The heat of lye has nothing or little to do with the outcome?

I tried a soap experiment where I made my lye solution & mixed my oils on Thursday evening & then Friday night after work I made soap. I gave my oils a 15 second burst in microwave simply because oils looked a bit sludgy. That was it. Added my room temp lye solution & sure enough batter heated nicely due to chemical reaction & the soap turned out Gr8. I even attempted to pipe some soap “icing”. Looks terrible & too sharp but it’s !

 

[gww]

I think it looks great.
Cheers
gww

 

[Zany_in_CO]

Why do you keep the lye solution in the fridge? Do you set it out to room temp prior to soaping?

Nope. I warm the oils before adding the lye solution. Works for me. Most of my soaps using this method were GM soaps for a wholesale customer.

 

[Zany_in_CO]

That explained perfectly the strange reactions I saw when making ZNSC and mixing the liquid portion. Sodium chloride did indeed precipitate out of the solution.

Hmmm. For some reason, I don't have that problem when making Faux Sea Water for ZNSC. I add the baking soda and sea salt to maybe a cup (?) of cold water. Stir it a bit, then nuke it until it's totally dissolved -- not yellowish. If it's not clear, then I hit it again. Then I add the rest of the quart of water and store it in the fridge where it sits until the next time I need it.

From one time to the next, I've never had it precipitate out... never even occurred to me... but then, I have been using that technique for dissolving sugar, salt and similar additives ever since I can remember.

 

[ResolvableOwl]

@Zany_in_CO @ScentimentallyYours
Your observations both make sense: lye dramatically reduces the solubility of salt in water:
https://www.soapmakingforum.com/threads/lye-water-will-not-clear-stays-white.85254/post-918233
Once again, the take-home message is to dissolve all additives in water, and only then the lye.

 

[earlene]

pardon my inexperience, you can use lye from the fridge or room temp and make soap? The heat of lye has nothing or little to do with the outcome?

No, the heat of the lye solution itself won't stop the oils from heating up, but it can slow and/or prevent over-heating when starting with a cool lye solution. Soapmakers often use cooling methods to prevent milk soaps from overheating in order to not scorch the milk and to maintain a lighter-colored soap, and for preventing volcanoing in soap recipes that include additives that promote rapid over-heating.

Hmmm. For some reason, I don't have that problem when making Faux Sea Water for ZNSC. I add the baking soda and sea salt to maybe a cup (?) of cold water. Stir it a bit, then nuke it until it's totally dissolved -- not yellowish. If it's not clear, then I hit it again. Then I add the rest of the quart of water and store it in the fridge where it sits until the next time I need it.

From one time to the next, I've never had it precipitate out... never even occurred to me... but then, I have been using that technique for dissolving sugar, salt and similar additives ever since I can remember.

It's probably the high heat of nuking that makes the difference. I almost always use boiling hot water (from my tea kettle) when dissolving sugar or salt for soapmaking. If I were to use my microwave instead, it would be just as hot, of course, but I like my tea kettle. Another difference could be that your Tablespoon of salt was measured slightly differently than @ScentimentallyYours' Tablespoon (level T vs heaping T, for example.)

I tried a soap experiment where I made my lye solution & mixed my oils on Thursday evening & then Friday night after work I made soap. I gave my oils a 15 second burst in microwave simply because oils looked a bit sludgy. That was it. Added my room temp lye solution & sure enough batter heated nicely due to chemical reaction & the soap turned out Gr8. I even attempted to pipe some soap “icing”. Looks terrible & too sharp but it’s !
View attachment 62343

Lovely soap, indeed! I use a beveler to remove sharp edges (they bother me, too.) You could do the same or even just use a potato peeler to un-sharpen along the edges of the soap.

 

[Basil]

Pretty much. Takes me about a hour since I empty and a clean my bucket out well, then I melt and mix 10lbs at a time. I could do it all at once, but I'm not as young as I was and would hate to have an accident and trying to clean that mess up. LOL And my bucket could hold another 20lbs, but 40lbs is working for me right now.

My recipe is 65% Hard Oils...Coconut and Palm Oils, and Cocoa and Shea Butters. I store the bucket in the kitchen and even though it can get cold in the house during the Winter, it doesn't get solid...about the consistency of cornbread batter. During the Summer...it's more like pancake batter. I do have a commercial paint stirrer that I attach to a drill and I give it a really good stir before using it. I have a rolling kitchen island that I use as my 'soaping cart' that I store my Lye Solution in. If I didn't have it, I'd put the jug under the kitchen sink behind the garbage can.

I have a spreadsheet on my wall above my cart. It lists all my molds and I have columns for Oils, Lye and FO. When I want to make soap, I get out whatever mold I am using, check the spreadsheet and then weigh out my stuff. I have a ladle that holds approximately 4oz so if I need 33oz, I tare my bowl, scoop 10 ladles, weigh and take out what I don't need or add a little more in. It goes in microwave at approximately 30 seconds per pound during the winter, 20 during the summer. While that is melting, I weigh out my Lye Solution and add Sodium Hydroxide, and weigh out my FO and add Kaolin Clay.

While it's true that it takes less time to make your Lye Solution (unless you are using milks) than it is to weigh and melt your oils...you have to wait for your Solution to cool down (unless you are doing the Heat Transfer method).

I like the fact that I can come home and whip up a couple of batches of soap in about a half hour.

I just saw this so I’m late in commenting, but the invitation to move in with me is still out there.