@Tara_H I have very thick, curtly, dry hair that tangles when wet. It is currently short, but till this past November, it was down to my elbow when straightened. I have no trouble working the conditioner bars through my hair either way.
With the recipe I linked, the only two ingredients you’d need to buy are BTMS and cetearyl alcohol. You can use whatever oil and butter you want instead of those she lists. And you can leave out the other extras I mentioned, as well. So the recipe would be:
Heated (primary) phase
15.00g | 30% BTMS-50
15.00g | 30% cetearyl alcohol
7.50g | 15% butter of choice
7.50g | 15%oil of choice
Secondary phase
0.50g | fragrance of choice
0.50g | 1% Optiphen
2.25g | 4.5% distilled water
You can split the additional 3.51% (from the removed ingredients) between the oils, butters, and BTMS. I personally love the addition of panthenol and silk in both bars and liquids, but I understand if you don’t want to buy more stuff. I recently used LGP instead of Optiphen (because I ran out of it) so I had to let it cool down further before adding it.
FYI on the lemon juice recommendation: if your hair leans towards dry, this can dry it further. It can also lighten your hair considerably, depending on your hair’s receptivity to lightening agents.
As for the vinegar recommendation, I can agree that it works very, very well. Unfortunately, people with sensitive sniffers can still smell it in your hair even after it has dried, unless you have another scent to cover it. Ask me how I know. ;-)