I got threads confused and was updating my More Mango with Modifications on another thread. From this thread post
Curious about syndet recipe I found + free resource library
I played a bit with shampoo bars again this weekend. I made two versions of the HB&M More Mango (still subbing with SLSa). The first version I used horsetail butter and that went together beautifully. I think there may be a difference between using butters and liquid oils in the recipe because I tried the second one with walnut oil and I needed to add quite a bit more water again to get it to come together. The one with horsetail butter I left unscented as I wanted a customer who orders shampoo bars without fragrance to try the new recipe. The "old" recipe I was using had BTMS in it and stunk of fish quite a bit, so it might be more pleasant for her to use. The second one was for my hubby and the boys - they're going through the first bar I made a bit fast because both of the boys are using it head to toe. I also made a HB&M's Green French Clay bar
French Green Clay Sulphate-Free Shampoo Bar - Humblebee & Me but had to sub Caprylyl/Capryl Glucoside with CAPB, so I need to test the pH yet. It took a bit more water to get that to come together too. I wasn't sure about adding the carageenan as I've tried it before in a bar and it seemed to make it sticky for weeks. After an hour these weren't sticky so it might have been something else in the other bar that caused the stickiness. The last bar I made this weekend was HB&M's Rhassoul Clay bar
Chocolate Rhassoul Shampoo Bars - Humblebee & Me which I've made before and quite like. I subbed 2% of the clay with activated charcoal, and melted the SCS quite a bit with the cocoa butter and stearic acid so that it was a more smooth moldable dough with only a few SCS noodles intact.
And here's today's update on those bars. The two I was particularly watching were the first and second bars. Here's what happened after 3 days of cure:
A reminder of my modifications: replaced C14-16 with SLSa, replaced Polyquaternium 7 with Honeyquat, experimenting with different oils/butters in place of mango butter.
Differences between the blue and white bars shown: White bar has no color or fragrance added and used
horsetail butter blend in place of mango butter (ingredients: Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis (Almond) Oil (and) Equisetum arvense extract (and) Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil). I have a full pound on hand and have a customer whose hair loves it so I'm trying to use it up, but now that I understand butter blends better, I'm not sure this is a butter I would choose long term.
Blue bar has color and fragrance added (1/2 tsp mica, which was probably heavy handed for a 200g batch, and 1% FO), and used walnut oil in place of mango butter.
During making I noticed how smoothly the white bar went together, it really was moldable and I didn't need to add any extra water at all. The blue bar I had to add approx 40g water to get it to a moldable consistency where it would hold it's shape.
After 3 days curing, one of the blue bars had spontaneously broken apart, the second blue bar has spider web cracks consistently through the bar so I suspect that it will fail a drop test. The water evaporation from the blue bars is too much to keep the bars together.
Interestingly, the white bars are still perfectly smooth, no cracking. I gave one of the bars 5 drops onto the concrete floor and the bar remained intact.
Based on this, there is a difference in the recipe between using a hard oil/butter and a soft oil. I have several thoughts, the first being how much would I need to increase the soft oil to equal the results of a hard oil/butter and would there be impact to the shampoo performance? I don't feel like messing with this to find out, mostly because I have sal butter, mowrah butter, shea butter and cocoa butter, or even coconut oil if I want to do that route, on hand.
My next thought is that I need to try this again for the blue bar (it's a requested fragrance) with butter. So this weekend I will be remaking the blue bar using the SLSa and using a butter. This will be excellent timing as I have C14-16 now, so I can also make a bar using that with the same butter and compare the two bars equally.
My last thought is... what can I do with these two failed bars? My first thought is to grate them up and heat until melted enough to remold, but I'm wondering if melting would be enough to hold them or if I should add a bit of hard oil - and how much hard oil? Equal to the amount of water lost during evaporation? I do know how much water weight they lost as I took careful notes when I weighed out each bar during pressing. Water loss was one thing I was curious about. What would YOU do?
Edited to correct a few grammar issues.