Do your salt bars shrink during cure?

[Soapsugoii]

I'm trying to calculate individual mold size so I can get custom salt bar molds made. I want them to shrink to be the same size as my regular bars (which I make in loafs), but I don't think my salt bars shrink quite as much as the regular ones. Anyone have experience with salt bar shrinkage? I use between 50% to 70% salt.

 

[savonierre]

I am pretty sure mine haven't shrunk much at all, nothing like regular cp for sure. Can you try to make them the same size from the start.

 

[Kansas Farm Girl]

To me it makes sense that salt bars might not shrink as much because of the bulk of the salt. I don't make salt bars very often so I can't really prove that theory. I do want to make some more, and will have to watch for that.

 

[jenneelk]

I would think the salt keeps the structure of the soap intact and while they might lose water since there is still a good amount in there, it just makes them more crumbly and harder, not smaller.
Mine don't seem to have shrunk at all after 4 weeks.

 

[Soapsugoii]

Yea, they definitely don't shrink as much as my regular CP, but I want to get them as close to the same size/shape as the CP bars I currently sell. My silicon slab mold bar dimensions are different from my CP bars, so it's hard to compare. I'll have to measure a bar when I unmold it tonight and again in a few weeks just to make sure, but I have a feeling I'll be ordering the molds pretty close to the size of a well cured CP bar. We'll see, though!