lavender.dreams.candles
Well-Known Member
What's the difference between KOH and Lye???
What's the difference??
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craftykelly
Well-Known Member
Koh is Potassium Hydroxide used in liquid soap making.
For (solid) soap making you need Sodium Hydroxide - Na OH.
For (solid) soap making you need Sodium Hydroxide - Na OH.
Bunny
Well-Known Member
KOH is lye as well, just a different form of it.
Sodium hydroxide (called also "caustic soda") is what hard soap is made with, and potassium hydroxide (often called potash) is what one uses to make liquid soaps.
Potash, or potassium hydroxide is the type of lye folks would get from soaking wood ashes. It's the stuff that the old folks used to make their farm lye soaps. They would leach the ashes with water and keep doing it over and over until the mixture was strong enough to float an egg. Then they would mix it with their fats and cook it and make soap. Potassium hydroxide does make a solid soap, but that solid is in turn diluted and mixed with water to make liquid soaps. You can't do that with sodium hydroxide soaps because no matter how much water you add, the stuff just keeps wanting to form a solid, albeit a soft one.
Sodium hydroxide (called also "caustic soda") is what hard soap is made with, and potassium hydroxide (often called potash) is what one uses to make liquid soaps.
Potash, or potassium hydroxide is the type of lye folks would get from soaking wood ashes. It's the stuff that the old folks used to make their farm lye soaps. They would leach the ashes with water and keep doing it over and over until the mixture was strong enough to float an egg. Then they would mix it with their fats and cook it and make soap. Potassium hydroxide does make a solid soap, but that solid is in turn diluted and mixed with water to make liquid soaps. You can't do that with sodium hydroxide soaps because no matter how much water you add, the stuff just keeps wanting to form a solid, albeit a soft one.
lavender.dreams.candles
Well-Known Member
So where can I buy KOH???
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