Stain Stick additive idea

[Feelin' Soapy]

I'm thinking about making stain sticks with 100% coconut oil and adding some washing soda to boost it a bit. DH can get his clothes pretty greasy and I thought the extra kick might be good.
Do any of you wise folks out there know if this would be a helpful addition, and if so, how much do I add and when? Do I use 1:1 water with the lye, and mix the soda with the remainder of the water and add that to the oil at trace?
Thanks for any wisdom you can share on this!

 

[Feelin' Soapy]

Was hoping to get some input on this. Would washing soda be a helpful booster in a Stain Stick or should I just stick with the CO on its own?

 

[AliOop]

I've never tried the washing soda in mine; they work very well with just 100% CO and 0%SF. I've recently started adding d-limonene as an additional degreaser, since most of my stains are greasy due to soap making or rendering lard and tallow.

I'm pretty sure the CO and d-limonene (alone and together) make for a much stronger degreaser than the washing soda would do, but maybe someone else can weigh in on whether I'm correct about that. Meanwhile, please let us know if you try it.

 

[Feelin' Soapy]

Thank you, @AliOop!

 

[Savage Daughter]

Personally, I would definitely try some washing soda. It's something I use in laundry all the time, along with borax, and the powder form of hydrogen peroxide - the proper name is escaping me right now. That is some awesome stuff for laundry!

I seem to remember someone saying - maybe on YouTube? - that citric acid is great in stain sticks. D-limonene is something I use for removing labels & other difficult to remove things from glass & other stuff, but with gloves as it can be incredibly harsh on the skin. It definitely works for that purpose, although I haven't tried it in relation to laundry....hadn't even occurred to me, actually.

I'd be very interested in hearing how your experimenting with this goes as I am planning on making stain sticks for home use soon.

 

[Feelin' Soapy]

I and everyone I've shared them with has been super impressed with the stain-busting power of the CO and d-limonene stain stick. It's gotten out stains I've had in some clothes for a year or more. Now, when I dribble food on my shirt I get all excited about another stain stick challenge!

 

[AliOop]

I seem to remember someone saying - maybe on YouTube? - that citric acid is great in stain sticks.

Citric acid is converted by the NaOH into sodium citrate. That makes a nice chelator, but it does mean that no CA is available for stain-fighting.

Also, you have to adjust the NaOH to account for the CA. You can find those adjustments on DeeAnna’s Soapy Stuff page on her website. Or you just use sodium citrate to start with, so that no lye adjustment is needed.

 

[Terri E]

Personally, I would definitely try some washing soda. It's something I use in laundry all the time, along with borax, and the powder form of hydrogen peroxide - the proper name is escaping me right now. That is some awesome stuff for laundry!

I seem to remember someone saying - maybe on YouTube? - that citric acid is great in stain sticks. D-limonene is something I use for removing labels & other difficult to remove things from glass & other stuff, but with gloves as it can be incredibly harsh on the skin. It definitely works for that purpose, although I haven't tried it in relation to laundry....hadn't even occurred to me, actually.

I'd be very interested in hearing how you’re experimenting with this goes as I am planning on making stain sticks for home use soon.

I would love to try some stain sticks as well, I have just been using my salt bars which seem to work very well! I would like to try it with the sodium citrate, d-limonene, the sodium percarbonate and poly 80.

 

[Savage Daughter]

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I would love to try some stain sticks as well, I have just been using my salt bars which seem to work very well! I would like to try it with the sodium citrate, d-limonene, the sodium percarbonate and poly 80.

THAT'S what I was talking about. Sodium percarbonate! Pardon the memory lapse but I don't often take it out of my laundry room I have a huge bag in there at all times. I use it for all of my loads. It doesn't bleach out colors like bleach but gets whites super white.

Great for the towels & rags I use when making soap. It even got out some indigo & madder root stains which were old cotton towels which I thought would never be stain-free.

Awesome stuff

 

[Savage Daughter]

I and everyone I've shared them with has been super impressed with the stain-busting power of the CO and d-limonene stain stick. It's gotten out stains I've had in some clothes for a year or more. Now, when I dribble food on my shirt I get all excited about another stain stick challenge!

I was thinking about the d-limonene last night....because it tends to 'melt' things so easily, an amazing solvent for cleaning up hard-to-scrub messes, I was wondering if it would have a detrimental effect on synthetic fibres like nylon, polyester, things like that. Might affect the longevity of those fabrics.

 

[Savage Daughter]

Citric acid is converted by the NaOH into sodium citrate. That makes a nice chelator, but it does mean that no CA is available for stain-fighting.

Also, you have to adjust the NaOH to account for the CA. You can find those adjustments on DeeAnna’s Soapy Stuff page on her website. Or you just use sodium citrate to start with, so that no lye adjustment is needed.

Good idea, I had forgotten about the citric acid / lye equation

 

[Feelin' Soapy]

I was wondering if it would have a detrimental effect on synthetic fibres like nylon, polyester, things like that. Might affect the longevity of those fabrics.

Synthetic fibers tend not to stain as easily, and most of my clothes are cotton, so I don't know if the limonene is hard on synthetics. I guess I'd rather have a shorter-lived clean shirt than a stained shirt that never wears out anyway.

 

[Savage Daughter]

Synthetic fibers tend not to stain as easily, and most of my clothes are cotton, so I don't know if the limonene is hard on synthetics. I guess I'd rather have a shorter-lived clean shirt than a stained shirt that never wears out anyway.

I have found the exact opposite with my clothing, actually. I can get stains out of my cotton clothing much more easily than I can out of shirts & pants which are synthetic or blended fibres.

This is one of the reasons I love that hydrogen peroxide powder. I get VERY dirty where I live, wild foraging, hauling straw bales, digging in the dirt, hiking, and just sweating like a farm animal all day long while working outdoors That stuff works like a hot damn to get stains out of everything, and my clothing still looks presentable for when I need to wander back into 'civilization' for errands, shopping & so on.

Easiest way to find out is to test the d-limonene on various fabrics, some old shirts & pants or even some rags made from various fabric types. That way you'd know for sure