Why did it accelerate?

[Obsidian]

Tries a new recipe with a new additive and it accelerated on me. Not bad enough I couldn't glop it in a mold but it wasn't too far off.
I know its not the FO, used it before and it behaves beautifully. Wondering if the the recipe or the addition of baby oatmeal? Here is the recipe, just want to try and avoid this in the future.

http://www.evernote.com/l/ANi3icPMY-tKvqXTq1SQAFw28dDwLI7PnMQ/

Oatmeal, FO, SL and TD all went into the oils first. Once it was emulsified, I separated and colored one part green. By the time I got the green mixed in, it had set up and I had to start glopping.

 

[soapmaker]

I think you know way more than I do, but my guess is the castor oil and cocoa butter. Certainly not the baby oatmeal. And you're used to the FO but I wouldn't add that before emulsion and separating for colour. Just a habit of mine when I need to mix up different colours, FO goes in last.

 

[shunt2011]

I don’t see anything that jumps out.

My recipe is high lard and I use Shea at 10% and rice bran. Maybe it is the FO. I’ve had well behaved FO act up in a new recipe.

I always add my FO to my oils with the exception if they are fast movers like florals. Then I add separately.

Maybe you just had a visit from the soap gremlins.

 

[Obsidian]

I don’t see anything that jumps out.

My recipe is high lard and I use Shea at 10% and rice bran. Maybe it is the FO. I’ve had well behaved FO act up in a new recipe.

I always add my FO to my oils with the exception if they are fast movers like florals. Then I add separately.

Maybe you just had a visit from the soap gremlins.

Thats why this is so weird. I've use castor at 10% before and butters at 25% and never had issues. I don't know if I'll use this recipe again but if I do, I'll try unscented and see how it behaves.

Guess I'll just chalk it up to gremlins and be careful with that particular FO, just in case.

 

[soapmaker]

Sure seems strange with Lard in it. I use lard when I want time to play.

 

[bumbleklutz]

I use castor and cocoa butter in almost all of my recipes, but usually never more than 5%-7% each; but I don't think it was either of those.

Out of curiosity was this an FO you purchased recently? Perhaps within the last 6-8 months? The reason that I ask is that BASF (the chemical company) had a major fire that destroyed a plant that makes many of the chemicals that are used in our FOs. In fact, if I'm not mistaken; they are the only manufacturer of some of them. Subsequently, many manufacturers have re-formulated their FOs to use other chemicals not manufactured by BASF.

While the FO may look and smell the same, chemically it may be a different formula from your "old reliable" FO; and that may be what caused your major acceleration. I had this happen in reverse. I was using a citrus FO that behaves beautifully. It was always reliable. It never rices, never accelerates, never heats up. I added the FO at light trace, and the batter separated instantly. I did get it to come back to trace, but it took awhile. I latter found out that the FO had been re-formulated due to the BASF fire. I would check with the supplier to see if the FO has recently been re-formulated.

 

[cmzaha]

I use baby oatmeal a lot, in dry form and from a jar with no acceleration. I am guessing the 10% castor oil. I do know for a fact, from testing, even 2% difference in Castor makes acceleration difference, and added with the Coco butter I am betting it is the problem

 

[Obsidian]

That's a really good question. It is a new bottle of FO, the last bottle I had was purchased last year.
The supplier doesn't say if its reformulated or not, I'll have to find out.

@cmzaha thing is I use castor at 10% in a few soaps with no issues. Thats why this was such a mystery to me. It didn't just trace fast, it was nearly soap on a stick and it really heated up in the mold.

 

[DeeAnna]

If it's not the FO nor tha castor, could it be some source of sugar, given that it heated up so much? Could the baby oatmeal have sugars of some sort in it? Just a total, wild guess -- it's worth what you paid for it.

 

[Obsidian]

No sugar but there are a lot of additives.

 

[penelopejane]

No sugar but there are a lot of additives.

It could be the oatmeal additives:
“Use as a Food Additive. Potassium phosphate helps stabilize, thicken and regulate the acidity and moisture in foods. It's often used in large amounts in soft drinks, canned fish, processed meats, sausages, ham and baked goods.”

I use butters and castor and it doesn’t accelerate. AC acellerates on me though.

 

[cmzaha]

Makes me wonder if the thickener reacts with something in the FO. As I mentioned above, I use jar baby oatmeal quite often with not problems, but there is one thing I used to use in soap, sorry memory fails me this morning, which included a thickener and it did accelerate. I just remember it used to happen can't remember what the additive was. I am thinking it very well may have been a baby food fruit, so maybe the particular thickener in the brand you use is causing the problem. Now it is going to drive me nutso all day trying to remember which product it was that caused me a problem.

 

[amd]

I have had this happen when I add ground oatmeal to soap. If I add it at a light-medium trace I don't have a problem, but when I add it to my oils before lye water it does it. The only reasonable* explanation I have figured out is that the oats start expanding when liquid is added so the batter responds by accelerating. When I add it at trace the liquid is emulsified into the oils so the oats don't have as much liquid to grab onto and don't expand.

*reasonable as far as the way that my mind reasons things out based on my experience. ymmv

 

[Obsidian]

If I would have read the label on the oatmeal, I wouldn't have bought it. I wrongly assumed baby cereal would be just the cereal. I'll have to try adding it to my next batch and see how it behaves. If it does cause acceleration, I'll toss it and find a brand without all the added junk.

@amd that makes sense except that I added the oatmeal to water before I added it to the oils. I didn't want to risk getting clumps.

 

[amd]

@amd that makes sense except that I added the oatmeal to water before I added it to the oils. I didn't want to risk getting clumps.

Ah, I see. The way you said this:

Oatmeal, FO, SL and TD all went into the oils first.

Led me to believe you added them to the oils before adding the lye. You meant to say that you didn't add them at trace gotcha

 

[NsMar42111]

I use gerber baby oatmeal and it's the same ingredients, it doesn't cause me any issues-I wouldn't blame the baby cereal.

I had issues with TD causing my batter to thicken too much before. It also makes HP go a weird gloppy feel instead of flowy molten lava like normal.

I would look long and hard at the FO first, I remember a basil fragrance giving me a hard time during testing once -different supplier though. The recipe itself looks fine and if you subbed rice for avacado it's similar to what I use all the time!