First batch is disappointing :/

Here's what happened. Lots of lessons were learned. One is don't put your essential oils in a cheap plastic dixie cup type thing ya drug out of the bathroom. I went to move it and the bottom was stuck to the freezer paper but the top portion pulled away and I lost a half a bottle of essential oils. It ate through the plastic.(glad I had freezer paper down). so I got a small jar and poured the rest in it. Okay that's cool moving on.

Now everything went really well, I mixed the lye in the oils and did the blender thing and it was going really good Then I parted half out to color cause I wanted a kind of swirl thing going on. I put in the color into the rest of the pot but didn't stir it cause you kind of want it to swirl when you pour it in the mold. I was ready to pour it in the mold when I see the essential oils sitting there. Oh No! I says. I can't have the soap not scented. So i think well its just going to have to be a green color cause I'm going to have to mix it. So I put the EO in and blend it. Omg, it gets all bubbly and chunky. At this point its getting THICK and has to be poured somewhere. I said to myself " just pour the chunky mess in the mold" It is what it is. :/ In conclusion it seems that all the problems seem to lie with the essential oil from hell. Should I try again? I think so.
Any help is appreciated as to what happened with the oil and the little chunks.
Thanks

dwolanin said:

Here's what happened. Lots of lessons were learned. One is don't put your essential oils in a cheap plastic dixie cup type thing ya drug out of the bathroom. I went to move it and the bottom was stuck to the freezer paper but the top portion pulled away and I lost a half a bottle of essential oils. It ate through the plastic.(glad I had freezer paper down). so I got a small jar and poured the rest in it. Okay that's cool moving on.

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So sorry you had issues, I myself had a hot mess on my hands just last week involving the same EO problem and a Solo plastic cup...lesson learned!

i'm sorry to hear about your experience

what kind of EO were you using? not an EO expert here, but are you sure it was meant for soap making? i had a similar experience a while ago with a thing called: lemongrass oil. it wasn't EO and def had a bad reaction with the lye, and gave me a lightning fast trace which ended with a soap on a stick.

and yeah, def don't use plastic cups for FO/EO... coz now you know why

What EO was it? It kinda sounds like you had acceleration but I've not heard of EO causing that. Getting it into the mold quickly was the best thing and your soap should be just fine. Everyone has a bad batch on occasion, keep trying and you'll get it

Yes- you are right- it sounds like classic acceleration caused by the added scent (be it an essential oil or a fragrance oil.) Thankfully, not all essential oils or fragrance oils will cause acceleration,

Which essential oil did you use? The ones that contain eugenol, like clove and cinnamon, for example, are notorious for causing acceleration. Other compounds found in essential oils that cause acceleration are thymol (from thyme oil) and carvacrol (from oregano and thyme), and also salicylaldehyde (from meadowsweet).

Some people have reported good results from adding the ornery-behaving essential oil (or fragrance oil) directly to their batch oils, and then slowly adding only 1/2 of the lye solution into the oils at a time, mixing only with a spoon or spatula (no stickblender), and then once mixed in, adding the remainder of the lye solution (hand-stirring only). Although it won't prevent things from moving at a quick pace on the whole, it will slow things down enough to be more manageable. This method has worked for me with a few of my more ill-behaved FOs.


IrishLass

Thanks for the replies

I used a Lemongrass EO from BA. I don't know if i should say who I got it from but I Thought it was okay for soaping.

Here's the recipe i used..
Castor 5%
Coconut 76 25%
Palm Oil 25%
Olive Oil 40%
Mango Butter 5%

Everything worked out great until the EO :/
I'm going to try again, maybe tomorrow.
No more plastic dixie cups!

your recipe looks fine, pretty similar to what i've done before. i've used lemongrass EO many times and it's pretty well behaved, except for that lemongrass oil which def wasn't meant for cp soapmaking. if you are keen to try it one more time with the same EO, i would do what IrishLass suggested... or hp. by doing hp, you are adding the EO after the cook, no more active lye present, the EO should be okay and wouldn't give you funky stuff.

After I added the EO I used the stick blender. That's when it went south. I knew I had forgotten to tap the air out of the blades. At first that's what i thought I had done. I thought I had incorporated air into the mix. But then it got chunkies. Maybe I should have just stirred it in. Also I get a bad suctioning on the stick blender. It sticks on the bottom of the pot. Does anyone else have that problem? I tried to keep it up off the bottom as much as I could. :roll:

my sb does the same too (suctioning). next time you might want to just hand stir the EO.

Hey, disasters happen when you're starting out. Lord knows I had some doozies. I would suggest, if you're not already doing it, to keep notes on everything. Your process, your oils, your EO's/FO's and your suppliers. It will help you tremendously down the road in avoiding most of the unsuspecting mishaps or from repeating mistakes.

PS. It also helps to check your notes periodically. I had one batch not too long ago trace really fast, with a scent that I had used before with no problems. When i went to notate it in my notes, I realized that I had a note on this FO from a certain supplier, that seemed to speed up trace. Thought to myself, that would have been a good thing to check before I started the batch. :think:

dwolanin said:

After I added the EO I used the stick blender. That's when it went south. I knew I had forgotten to tap the air out of the blades. At first that's what i thought I had done. I thought I had incorporated air into the mix. But then it got chunkies. Maybe I should have just stirred it in. Also I get a bad suctioning on the stick blender. It sticks on the bottom of the pot. Does anyone else have that problem? I tried to keep it up off the bottom as much as I could. :roll:

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From what is written above, it sounds like the EOs were dumped in all at once. When stick blending after all is mixed and traced lightly, add the EOs slowly. No clump (IME).

seven said:

my sb does the same too (suctioning). next time you might want to just hand stir the EO.

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^^^

If you will hold your stick blender at at least a 30 degree angle, you should not have the suctioning issue. But we have all been there with fast moving scents.

goji_fries said:

From what is written above, it sounds like the EOs were dumped in all at once. When stick blending after all is mixed and traced lightly, add the EOs slowly. No clump (IME).



^^^

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Oh Goodness, That's exactly what I did. I just dumped it in....Me Facepalms.

I always just dump it in, never have issues unless its a scent that accelerates and in that case, I want to get it in and stirred as quick as possible.

Ouch! Will be interested to see how the soap comes out.

It won't help with that one issue now after the fact, but I would say to read a whole lot of stuff on the beginner and cp areas, especially when people are asking about what went wrong or talking about a soap disaster - as soon as I saw you mention plastic cups I knew what was coming and as Lucky said, she had this issue very recently and posted about it. Her experience would have saved you the hassle.

I use lemongrass EO from NDA, and have never had acceleration. Are you sure it wasn't an FO? Or maybe one of those nature-identical blends that some companies have?

I have been researching what happened to my soap. I found a great article by BB with some pictures and it looks like ricing, tapioca pudding has happened.
I'm hoping this is only cosmetic and I can still use.

I've used that lemongrass EO from NDA also with no problems whatsoever. Wonder if they changed their supplier. I don't have any of their lemongrass EO on hand tight now or I would test it.

What I've found *helps* - not fixes - is to put my scent in with the base oils and SB the heck out of it before adding the lye solution. In my mind, this gets the scent mixed in well, even if it's going to speed up on me.

If I have a new FO or one I KNOW will try to seize, I use more water than I normally would.

I have a very popular scent that is just a nasty old witch to work with, and the only thing that helps not to lose the batch is a lot of water.

I do the same thing as pamielynn. I add my EO's/FO's to my oils and stick blend well before adding my lye mixture. I find it also give me a bit more time to work with it if it's a fast mover.