temperature

[catikit]

Anyone able to advise me on the difference to my soap if i combine oils/lye at 120F vs 100F?

 

[brnicholas]

Some people put a lot of importance on the temperatures but I don't think it makes much difference at all. I never take the temperature. I mix the lye and water and leave for about 15 minutes. Then I come back and melt and mix the oils and let it cool for another 15 minutes. Then I come back and start mixing. The soap gets very hot but I have never ruined a batch and my soap always gels well.

If you are using milk or honey or anything sugary you will want to make it cooler so that it doesn't scorch. I don't think it matters with vegetable oils, especially if you want it to get.

Br Nicholas

 

[catikit]

Great-that sounds nice and simple. Thank you.

 

[yoenoess]

i prefer Room temperature

lower temp will trace slower, so dont need to rush

i usually pre mix my oil at previous day at large batch

 

[soapbuddy]

I go by touch. If the pot is very warm and same with the lye pitcher, I'm good to go. It's around 110 degrees when I soap.

 

[MissMori]

I soap around body temp or a tiny bit higher. I feel the side of the pot and lye container. When there are just about body temp (isn't hot or cold to the touch) I'm ready.

I think my soap is better at this temp than higher. I've tried all the way up to 120F and found that body temp is what works for me.

If you are using oils or waxes with a high melt point, you may want to go a bit higher.

 

[carebear]

I'm usually 110-115. I was room temp/cooled lye and pils for a long time, but warm seems to work better, even with most tricky FOs.

 

[IrishLass]

I soap at 120 degreesF with all my soaps that contain a combo of hydrogenated PKO and butters like cocoa, mango and/or kokum. It makes a huge difference for me (a positive one for the better). Whenever I had soaped these particular formulas in the past at room temp instead, like clockwork I would always get pseudo-trace (what looks like a real trace that comes on fairly quick, but actually isn't trace at all- just my hard fats precipitating out), and those unsightly 'stearic spots' throughout my finished soap. Through trial and error I learned that soaping at higher temps in those batches keeps my solid fats high enough above their melting points so that they don't precipitate out of the emulsion and revert back to their naturally solid state as I'm mixing 'this or that' additive into my soap batter that might bring the temp of my batter down lower.


IrishLass

 

[busymakinsoap!]

I totally agree with Irish Lass.

And I think it completely depends on your original recipe. If I have a lot of solid butters (which I usually do) I soap at about 115 -120 otherwise I end up with globs of fat in my bars. and overall it just performs better.

However if I wanted to do a lot of swirling or something technical, I would use a recipe that didnt have a lot of hard oils and soap at room temp.

There has been a lot of talk on here about the benefits of soaping cool, which made me try it. But I think at the end of the day, the temp completely depends on your recipe and what you want from your batch.

 

[Dragonkaz]

I soap in the around 35C (oils and lye) ... and so far there's been no issues.

 

[Relle]

I soap at RT and have had no issues, I've never measured the temp. I make the lye up and leave for an hour or more ,then melts solid oils add to liquid oils and away I go.