Soap behaving abnormally

[Karan1]

Hi every one this is Karan ,
New to this forum
I am making soaps for past three years , trust me every time it’s a new challenge
Lately my three batches spoiled which I can’t figure out what’s the problem
Would highly appreciate if you could guide what’s wrong I am doing
The recipe
Castor oil - 7%
Coconut oil - 20%
Palm stearin - 20%
Palm oil - 20%
Sunflower oil - 33%
Citric acid - 2%
Temperature - 100 f
Super fat - 7%
Lye calculation by soapcalc
Salt - 2 tsp
Fragrance ratio - 31
Water - 38%
Lye -26.5%
My clients requested for a long lasting and moisturising soap , so I calculated this recipe
But the problem I am facing is there are small rivers of oil in the final soap
Request you all to pls advise
Regards

 

[Karan1]

Sorry ....sat is 1tsp

 

[KiwiMoose]

Hi Karan,
A few things i can see is that your lye concentration is probably too low. You should increase it to around 30 - 33%. This low concentration is most likely what has caused the glycerin rivers in your third soap picture, because it makes it heat up more during saponification.
I think the oils that i can see in the third picture is possibly due to high humidity - I get that all the time during humid weather.
The first two look like caverns from soap overheating during saponification too. Increasing your lye concentration will also help with this, and keeping the soap cool/preventing gel phase. Have a look through this thread to find more information on this.

 

[Rsapienza]

Too much water would be my guess.

 

[dibbles]

I agree with the others with too much water and that the soap got too hot. One other thing that sticks out to me - what do you mean by fragrance ratio 31, and what fragrance oil or essential oil did you use? Not too long ago, I used a fragrance oil that caused my soap to overheat and the result was like what you are showing.

 

[Karan1]

Thanks a lot kiwi

Hi Karan,
A few things i can see is that your lye concentration is probably too low. You should increase it to around 30 - 33%. This low concentration is most likely what has caused the glycerin rivers in your third soap picture, because it makes it heat up more during saponification.
I think the oils that i can see in the third picture is possibly due to high humidity - I get that all the time during humid weather.
The first two look like caverns from soap overheating during saponification too. Increasing your lye concentration will also help with this, and keeping the soap cool/preventing gel phase. Have a look through this thread to find more information on this.

thanks a lot kiwimoose I think you are right since I am sing citric acid and my super fat is also by 7% , I need to increase the lye percentage

 

[Karan1]

I agree with the others with too much water and that the soap got too hot. One other thing that sticks out to me - what do you mean by fragrance ratio 31, and what fragrance oil or essential oil did you use? Not too long ago, I used a fragrance oil that caused my soap to overheat and the result was like what you are showing.

Hi dibbles , thanks for the reply
The fragrance are the same which I was your using earlier with no issue , I think you are right water and lye may be the cause

 

[Karan1]

I agree with the others with too much water and that the soap got too hot. One other thing that sticks out to me - what do you mean by fragrance ratio 31, and what fragrance oil or essential oil did you use? Not too long ago, I used a fragrance oil that caused my soap to overheat and the result was like what you are showing.

Dibbled I have Put this soap in freezer since here in India it’s monsoons so too much of humidity but as you suggested let me try reducing the water percentage
But if I reduce the water percentage then will it be possible to get intricate swirls

 

[dibbles]

I recommend using lye concentration rather than water as percent of oils on your soap-calculator. I often use a 33% lye concentration, but if you just want to try reducing your water a bit at first use a 30% lye concentration. You should have plenty of time to work. I've never used palm stearin so I don't know how that behaves in a recipe as far as speeding trace. I don't use a lot of palm oil, but when I do I almost always keep it at 20% or less, as it traces faster for me.

If you put the soaps pictured in the freezer and still got that kind of result, there is something happening here that I don't understand. If you know your fragrance oil is well behaved, the rest of the recipe shouldn't be an issue.

 

[Karan1]

thanks dibbles
If you remember my recipe has 7% super fat , if I make it zero by this way the ratio of lye will increase ? Pls advise

 

[Karan1]

And the problem will be solved or should I increase the lye as you said

 

[Quanta]

thanks dibbles
If you remember my recipe has 7% super fat , if I make it zero by this way the ratio of lye will increase ? Pls advise

"Lye concentration" only means you change the water amount based on the lye amount, and the lye amount is still based on the amount of oils used.

Basically, "higher lye concentration" means you aren't increasing the amount of lye, you are decreasing the amount of water. Water should not normally be based on the amount of oils, but on the amount of lye. The 30-33% that @KiwiMoose suggested means that your lye solution is 30-33% lye, and the other 67-70% of the solution is water (or other soapmaking liquid). A higher lye concentration only means you added less water, but used the same amount of lye per pound of oils to get the superfat you want.

Water as a percent of oils doesn't make sense for most cold process recipes. Some oils need a lot of lye to turn into soap, and some need very little. This means that frequently you will end up with way too much water, if your recipe doesn't need a lot of lye. Glycerin rivers are caused by too much water, and are not caused by not having enough lye.

 

[dibbles]

Sorry I didn’t see this earlier. But what @Quanta explained it well.

 

[Marsi]

Hello Karan,

i am sorry to see that your pretty swirls overheated
i agree with others, increase your lye concentration to between 30% and 33%

i also suggest you reduce the temperature of your lye solution from 100F

and mix your batter to emulsion only
before you split your batter for your colours

tl;dr
changing the superfat changes the amount of Sodium hydroxide (NaOH) you use to make your soap

changing your lye concentration changes the amount of water you use to mix with your Sodium hydroxide to make your lye

a 50% lye concentration is the same weight of NaOH to water
a 33% lye concentration is about a third NaOH in your lye solution (33% being about a third - you are using one part Sodium hydroxide to 2 parts water)
a 30% lye concentration is 3 parts NaOH to 7 parts water (3 divided by 10 is 30%)

Thanks a lot kiwi

thanks a lot kiwimoose I think you are right since I am sing citric acid and my super fat is also by 7% , I need to increase the lye percentage

every 1% (by weight of oils) of citric acid you use increases your superfat by 4.6%
(to put this another way, 1 gram of citric acid consumes 0.624 grams of NaOH)

you do not need to make a manual adjustment if you are using the soapmaking calculator from this forum (Citric Acid is added as an ingredient)

Dibbled I have Put this soap in freezer since here in India it’s monsoons so too much of humidity but as you suggested let me try reducing the water percentage
But if I reduce the water percentage then will it be possible to get intricate swirls

i would like to add to dibbles answer above (to increase the lye concentration)

to suggest you soap with your lye cooler than 100F
and mix your batter only to emulsion before splitting for intricate swirls

 

[Zing]

You've got the experts weighing in on problem-solving already so I'll just pop in to say that your soaps still look great! I like the color combo. Good luck,

 

[Karan1]

Thanks a ton , highly appreciate
I am sure it will solve my problem

 

[Karan1]

You all are amazing , thanks A ton for helping ,
Though I have two more question
1) If we are using water discount won’t it accelerate trace
Is there any trick for slow trace
2) how can we increase the longevity of soap

 

[ResolvableOwl]

1) If we are using water discount won’t it accelerate trace
Is there any trick for slow trace

The answer is a definite “It depends”. Acceleration is complicated. Yes, there are plenty of situations where increasing the lye concentration (what you refer to as “water discount”) increases reaction rate/tracing, but there are enough recipes where higher concentration slows down a reaction.

At least as important as lye concentration is to keep temperatures down (though warm enough to prevent false trace), checking that the EOs/FOs and colourants are well behaved and don't accelerate too much, and most importantly keep SBing to the absolute minimum (barely stable emulsion, no further). Based on my experiences with palm oil and palm stearin, it might even be unnecessary to use a stick blender at all.

2) how can we increase the longevity of soap

Your recipe reads already quite hard (at least from the perspective of temperate climate, idk how it behaves under tropical conditions). Possible options are replacing sunflower oil by rice bran oil. And/or replace part of the palm oil by kokum/sal/shea/mango butter.

But don't underestimate storage/curing! If the current weather prohibits proper drying/curing, it might be easiest to just not make soap now, but wait until the weather becomes dry again. A properly cured soap (several months … years under dry conditions) is appreciably long-lasting even under wet bathroom conditions.

Keep in mind that self-made soap has a hard time to compete with commercial soap with respect to longevity anyway, since the natural glycerol will always act as a solubiliser. Keep in mind that worse longevity = good solubility = good cleaning power and abundant lather.

You could theoretically make a soap from 100% palm stearin, that is rock hard and super long-lasting, but doesn't lather much, doesn't feel good on the skin, and is impossible to make swirl designs with.

 

[Karan1]

Thanks a lot

 

[Karan1]

Today I made this soap , as per you advise lye concentration was changed to 33% , faced no issue There was no problem regarding glycerin river or what ever that was , thanks a lot
But another problem erupted , is it partial gelling , pls advise