Soap won't smell when wet!

[Juliesoapy]

Hi everyone! I started making soap about one month ago and I'm now starting to use my soaps. I used the recommended amount of EO and they smell great dry but once wet there is absolutely no odor. Have you ever encountered this situation? Should I increase the amount of EO? Also, I don't want to us FO, I wanted to stay natural. Thank you.

 

[Kamahido]

If you tell us your recipe along with how much essential oil you used it will be much easier to help you.

 

[Juliesoapy]

I used a recipe in volume instead of in weight I found here: https://www.diynatural.com/how-to-make-soap-2/
They suggest 20 drops of EO I used 40. The recipe was first weighed before being given in volume. My soaps turned out great and they are hard and wash well.

 

[artemis]

I used a recipe in volume instead of in weight I found here: https://www.diynatural.com/how-to-make-soap-2/
They suggest 20 drops of EO I used 40. The recipe was first weighed before being given in volume. My soaps turned out great and they are hard and wash well.

I started there. A lot of stuff on that site is wrong or even dangerous. I quickly left that recipe behind and moved on to calculating recipes by weight with a soap calculator like soapee.com. I doubt that had anything to do with your scent issue, but I recommend you do the same.

 

[psfred]

Even forty drops of EO could be pretty light scent, depending on what you used and how much soap you made.

I find 10-15 drops more than enough in a pound, but if you made more, you need more scent!

I usually find soaps have more scent when I lather them up than when they are dry after a good cure.

More details would help....

 

[SunRiseArts]

In my experience EOs disappear quickly in time. Are you allergic to fragrances? They stick much longer.

 

[shunt2011]

Recommendation for you. Never measure by volume. It varies to greatly and is inconsistent. Always measure by weight and run all recipes through a soap calculator. I would never trust someone's measurements. Also, never use glass as recommended in the link you posted. Even canning jars wouldn't be worth the risk. also, measure your EO by weight. Drops are not always consistent and depending on what size batch you make it may have not been enough. Amount of EO will also vary upon which EO's you are using. Some can only be used in very small amounts.

 

[amd]

Taking rough guestimates on the volume to weight measurements - It looks like this may be right around 1lb of oil. 40 drops isn't nearly enough EO for a cold process soap. Agree with the others to switch to a soap calculator and use weight measurements. Especially when swapping around the "other liquid oil" in the recipe. There will be slight differences in SAP value for each of the different liquid oils and it is always good practice to adjust your lye according to which oil you use. It probably isn't enough to make your soap "fail" unless you use a specialty oil such as jojoba (which I wouldn't recommend because of cost), just good practice to get into using the calculator.

 

[cmzaha]

I will agree that you did not use even close to the amount necessary, of course depending which EO you used. If your batch was around 1lb of oils I would have used 1 oz for most EO's, which translates into approx 456 drops, with 40 drops being approximately 0.08 oz. But drops are certainly not all the same and it is much better to use weight measurements for all aspects of soapmaking. Do keep in mind that not everyone can use Essential Oils and are better off with synthetic fragrance oils. Not all synthetic is bad...

 

[DeeAnna]

I would say Psfred has a very sensitive nose! Nothing wrong with that, but most of us have less discerning smellers and need a higher dose of scent.

I'm with Carolyn -- for EOs of the safer variety, a total of 3-6% by weight (1/2 to 1 oz per pound) is more realistic. Not all EOs are skin safe at these dosages, however, so it's up to you to be informed.

Once you start calculating the cost of EOs at these dosage rates, you'll see why a lot of us use fragrance oils instead. I often EOs in my lotions and other leave on products, but I almost always use FOs in my soap. FOs can be more cost effective and come in a much wider range of scents than EOs.

 

[psfred]

I do indeed have a very sensitive smeller for some things (I can smell the alarm pheromone in my bee hives VERY strongly, for instance), and prefer a level of scent in soap I suspect most people wouldn't smell at all. That said, if you cannot smell it, you didn't add enough for you.

If you don't have a small scale for EOs, get one, they are inexpensive. I wouldn't dismiss FO's out of hand. Essential oils are distilled from plant material, and can contain quite a few irritants that synthetic fragrances will not. They also smell different, of course, but tend to be expensive to very expensive in comparison to FOs, and since I assume you don't intend anyone to ingest your soap, the synthetic fragrances will not enter your body at more than tiny trace amounts.

And finally, some EOs just won't stay, they either get destroyed by the lye during saponification or evaporate -- citrus scents are well known for this behavior.

 

[Juliesoapy]

Thank you everyone for your input, it's greatly appreciated!