Citric acid confusion

Obsidian said:

I have this in my notes.

Citric acid is used to create sodium citrate for a chelating agent/hard water softener/lather booster. For every 1000 grams of oils, you would add 10 g of citric acid and 6 g of extra lye to your water solution to create sodium citrate without extra superfat.

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DeeAnna said:

No, that's not correct. The proportions of NaOH and KOH are MOLECULAR proportions, not weight proportions. The 60:40 recipe you mentioned is based on 60 KOH molecules for every 40 NaOH molecules. Since KOH molecules are 1.403 times heavier than NaOH molecules, you must take that into account whenever converting from the weight of one alkali one to the weight of the other. The dosage recommendation in Obsidian's post is for citric acid and NaOH.

See here for more about using acids in a dual lye soap: https://classicbells.com/soap/dualLye.html

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DeeAnna said:

No, that's not correct. The proportions of NaOH and KOH are MOLECULAR proportions, not weight proportions. The 60:40 recipe you mentioned is based on 60 KOH molecules for every 40 NaOH molecules. Since KOH molecules are 1.403 times heavier than NaOH molecules, you must take that into account whenever converting from the weight of one alkali one to the weight of the other. The dosage recommendation in Obsidian's post is for citric acid and NaOH.

See here for more about using acids in a dual lye soap: https://classicbells.com/soap/dualLye.html

Click to expand...