Soap not hardening...Help!!!

[Menny]

Hi everyone,
Last night around 1am did a small batch, 350 g of oils:
Coconut oil 25 %
Palm oil 25 %
Almond oil 30 %
Sunflower oil 15 %
Castor oil 5 %
Distilled water 36 % of oils
Lye 48 g.
I added 1 tsp sugar and 1 tsp salt to distilled water and stir till salt and sugar dissolved in water. Then add the lye. I kept accurate temperture of oils and lye around 110 f. Mix them all and it looks great, trace came after 4-5 minutes. I poured it into the mold. Check this now and its too soft...it was 12 hours ago....attached a foto.
What might be the reason it has not harden?
I looked at my recepie, and it seems to me there's too much water in it, that might be a reason?
The lye concentration is too low?
Maybe I used too muc almond oil?
Can I rebatch it?
Waiting for your help, Menny.

 

[shunt2011]

@Menny Did you gel your soap? If not with the amount of water you used it could take several days before you will be able to un-mold it.

 

[Menny]

I didn't, what is it? How do you gel your soap?

 

[Menny]

@Menny Did you gel your soap? If not with the amount of water you used it could take several days before you will be able to un-mold it.

Shunt, can I rebatch it somehow? I mean, say I will add oils and lye without water to reduce the water percentage (with a lye calculator of course) You think it might help?

 

[penelopejane]

Water as a % of oils = 36% is equivalent to lye concentration of 26. That’s a lot of water. Next time try lye concentration at 30%.

Just wait. The soap will be fine it will just take quite a few days to harden enough to unmold and a few extra weeks to cure than normal.

 

[Susie]

Before you try to rebatch, you need to figure out what went wrong. So just hang on a bit.

Can you convert that recipe to actual weights you used, please? It makes troubleshooting ever so much easier.

Did you use a lye calculator for this recipe?

 

[Menny]

Thank you Penelopejane, I'll wait.
Susie I've attached a foto of the lye calaulator in my first call take a look at it.

 

[Clarice]

Patience grasshopper.

I have learned the hard way (every pun intended) that putting soft goo out of reach of my prying fingers and “finding” them again a week later yields soap.

 

[Dawni]

Yep, that's what I do and the boys find it hard to believe - hide soap from myself lol

@Menny it might help do a bit of research on water amounts, for your future recipes. Sometimes even if you use less water, soft soap that takes more than a day to unmold depends on your recipe, weather, etc.

 

[shunt2011]

Shunt, can I rebatch it somehow? I mean, say I will add oils and lye without water to reduce the water percentage (with a lye calculator of course) You think it might help?

I wouldn't re-batch it. I would just let it sit and see what happens. Time in this case is your friend. If it doesn't harden, there may be something else going on. Measurements, etc.

 

[Menny]

Thank you all!
As far as I'm understanding from reading your replays, there must be an issue with the quantity of the water I used in relation to the quantities of the oils, I've used too much water and therfore it will take time for hardening and curing.
My question is, is there anything I can do now to speed up the process? I need to get rid of the extra water right? So, do you have any idea? Right now the soap is outside in the open air and there's a good cool northern wind, but is it enough? maybe I should warm it a bit?

 

[cmzaha]

I also would not rebatch it, just let it sit uncovered and it will harden. Your recipe really looks to be okay. Even though you have a lot of soft oils it is really the water keeping it from setting up quickly. If you want one that will set up faster you can up your palm to 30-40%. The more palm the quicker it sets up. Patience ! Soap has a way of teaching patience. I use 45% Palm in one of my recipes but it does not give a lot of swirl time

The water will evaporate during cure time. Next time you can type in "lye concentration", using 30-33%. This is not the water as percent of oil weight choice. I am not sure how it is listed in the calc are using, I use Soapee

 

[Donee']

Hide it from yourself as Dawni says

 

[dixiedragon]

Thank you all!
As far as I'm understanding from reading your replays, there must be an issue with the quantity of the water I used in relation to the quantities of the oils, I've used too much water and therfore it will take time for hardening and curing.
My question is, is there anything I can do now to speed up the process? I need to get rid of the extra water right? So, do you have any idea? Right now the soap is outside in the open air and there's a good cool northern wind, but is it enough? maybe I should warm it a bit?

https://www.soapqueen.com/bath-and-body-tutorials/tips-and-tricks/gel-phase/

Here are some pics of gel phase. This is not a requirement - there is nothing wrong with what you did, it just takes a bit more time.

But if you want to hurry things along...Put your soap mold in a glass baking dish, or on a baking tray covered with wax paper or parchment paper. Pre-warm your oven to 150 or so, whatever your lowest temperature is. Turn off the oven, put your soap mold in there, and leave. This process is trying to gently force gel stage. Sometimes I get very impatient and do "twice baked soap" - if my soap has gone through gel but I am still struggling to unmold, then I'll do this and it will harden it up more.

the reason I suggest putting the mold in a baking dish is that sometimes you can get a soap volcano and you don't want that all over your oven.
https://www.soapqueen.com/bath-and-body-tutorials/tips-and-tricks/soap-behaving-badly/

Soap will react with aluminum, which is why I suggest a glass baking dish or a baking sheet covered with something. I've never had it happen to me (in my oven, I've had a baby volcano or two in my soaping career) but better safe than sorry!

 

[Menny]

I have one more question on another issue so I'll take advantage on this thread and ask you here:
If you want to write the name of your lover for example on the soap, how do you do it?
I've attached a foto of soap that I made and try to write on it. I wrote wite a match and it doesn't look as accurate as I expected...

 

[Dawni]

I have one more question on another issue so I'll take advantage on this thread and ask you here:
If you want to write the name of your lover for example on the soap, how do you do it?
I've attached a foto of soap that I made and try to write on it. I wrote wite a match and it doesn't look as accurate as I expected...

Best to open a new thread for this, people might have excellent ideas and they might miss seeing it here.

But I think what you did actually looks nice. Most people use stamps on soap, could be graphic or text but while soap is still soft I imagine your match wasn't a bad idea, or maybe the end of a thin paintbrush would work too haha

 

[dixiedragon]

If you look on Etsy you can find people who will make custom acrylic stamps if you want to make dozens of bars with the name on then. I think what you did looks pretty good! It might be a case of experimenting until you find the right tool and right soap firmness.

This might help:
https://www.soapmakingforum.com/thr...lenge-carved-soap-designs-entry-thread.71503/

https://www.soapmakingforum.com/threads/sept-2018-smf-challenge-carved-soap-designs.71286/

One option might be to mix some mica with glycerin and paint it on.

 

[amd]

I soap with a higher water content (such as used in OP's post) and I can usually cut within 18 hours, however whenever I have used Sweet Almond Oil or Sunflower oil in recipes they take longer to setup, I haven't used a combination of the two in a soap (shocking...) so I would guess it's probably a combination of the oils and the water content. You can preheat your oven to the lowest temp it goes to (For me this is 170°F), turn off your oven, and put your soap in there overnight. This is called CPOP. I do it quite often with a soap that is setting up too slowly for my patience. ... DON'T forget to put a sticky over the controls on the oven so that everyone in the house knows there is soap in the oven.

 

[Dean]

I soap with a higher water content (such as used in OP's post) and I can usually cut within 18 hours, however whenever I have used Sweet Almond Oil or Sunflower oil in recipes they take longer to setup, I haven't used a combination of the two in a soap (shocking...) so I would guess it's probably a combination of the oils and the water content. You can preheat your oven to the lowest temp it goes to (For me this is 170°F), turn off your oven, and put your soap in there overnight. This is called CPOP. I do it quite often with a soap that is setting up too slowly for my patience. ... DON'T forget to put a sticky over the controls on the oven so that everyone in the house knows there is soap in the oven.

Good tip on CPOP.

I use AO in much higher amts w0 any softness.

I wonder if his water measuring was off.

 

[amd]

I use AO in much higher amts w0 any softness.

I wonder if his water measuring was off.

It may depend on what other oils are in combination with the Sweet Almond Oil I suppose. I've noticed that different recipes yield different results, so your results may vary from mine. The higher water content in combination with sweet almond oil may be causing the slow setup time, either way, CPOP will help speed that up - the extra water going off and encouraging the saponification rate of the oil.