sugar for bubbles

[dirrdee]

I added 1 T of sugar to my lye solution (in hopes of increasing bubbles) and it got very thick, like wallpaper paste. Is this normal, and am I doing this right? Im not sure if it worked or not cause this batch is really soft due to high olive oil and will need to cure...I want to make sure this is right before I add it to future batches.

 

[dirrdee]

I soaped another batch and tried the sugar disolved in the water before adding lye. An observation: Usually I have to put my lye mixture in an ice bath to cool it down before mixing with my oils. Somehow the sugar caused the lye to cool down by itself very quickly.

 

[scrubbie]

This happened to us. My stepson and I soap together. We added sugar one tablespoon ppo. We dissolved it in water first. Then we mixed the lye in next. It held the temp at 154 degrees and then dropped super fast to 109 degrees. It was like a minute or less with the drop. It made our rice brand soap a hit with who I gifted them to. It carmalized too. It made the solution goopy but everything was well mixed.

 

[green soap]

Do you folks use powdered (confectioner) sugar? Just a wild guess, but they use a little corn starch. I wonder if the heating would turn the mixture into a 'glaze' like when making sauce for stir fries? again, just speculation but it could explain the thickening.

I use granulated and that has never happened, but I was thinking about using powdered since it is easier to dissolve.

 

[Fragola]

Personally, I dissolve the sugar by boiling it in a little water and add it to the lye solution.

 

[dirrdee]

the first time I tried it, I added powdered sugar to the lye mixture, good grief, that just made a big snotty mess of the sugar and wouldnt disolve.
The past few times I used bakers sugar (its a finer granual) and added to the water first and then added the lye...worked great

 

[carebear]

i dissolve the sugar in my water before adding the lye.

i'd not waste energy heating water to dissolve something so soluble as sugar.
you can make a highly concentrated solution without doing so.