marathon soap (extra sweaty)

[herbaliser]

It looks like the soap went through a triathlon (possibly even a quadrathlon).

I did some soap-searching (get it? soap searching? har har) and people say it's either glycerin oozing out, or the fragrance oozing out, or water oozing out. I would have to rule out fragrance because it doesn't smell when I smell it, and is slightly oily consistency but not oily enough to be oil.

Is this caused by overheating or something more evil? I soap at around 90-100F and did not insulate this batch at all (no cover, no plastic wrap, no towels). The humidity here is low and the temperature is 60F. Usually I wipe it off, but this time I left it and it seemed to either re-absorb into the soap or evaporated. I couldn't really tell which.

I would have to conclude that it is glycerin and my soap is so godly in quality that it can't help but ooze this magical sauce. The question is, is there any way to have this not happen?

p.s.

I've done 8 batches and all have had similar results. I've double checked the recipes and they are all a-ok on soapcalc. Out of the batches, the only one that didn't have this effect was a 90/10 castile.

Mold is ~4lb flat mold made of mystery wood. Butcher paper (wax side up) lined.



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[MKRainville]

I am a very visual person...I think that if I could see a picture this would help!


I wonder what is causing this I have never heard of this before

 

[herbaliser]

Sorry, the picture is up. I uploaded it wrong when I posted 8)

 

[Sunny]

soap-searching? magical sauce?

I can't answer your question but please stay on this forum 8) u funnay

 

[herbaliser]

I feel loved. I think I'll stay.

On a side note, I should mention the soap is cold press, stick blended, by a human. I just googled where I live and apparently it's very dry here, so humidity probably is not the cause.

One more thing to add is my soap gets the cold sweats if I:

a) not insulate with anything
b) insulate with plywood on top of mold
c) insulate with plywood on top + towels

But the soap will overheat to varying degrees (puddles and puddles of oil, soft spongy mushy when cutting, etc.) if I:

a) cover with saran wrap without mold cover
b) cover with custom mold cover that sits directly on top of soap /w saran wrap taped to cover.

I'll include my recipe in case it's the recipe (or a specific oil):
20 coconut
40 extra virgin olive (possible culprit?!)
10 avocado
5 castor
5 wheat germ
20 palm

water 608g ~ 21.447oz
lye (NaOH - bead form) 220.148g ~ 7.765oz

water as percent of oil weight = 38%
lye concentration = 26.583%
water:lye ratio = 2.762:1
sat:unsat ratio = 37:63
iodine = 67
INS = 138

50g of a combination of mind-blasting essential oils.
7 tsp of various clays.
5% superfat/discount

total weight: 1600g ~ 3.5lb

I just realized something while I was typing this. The batch in which I didn't get any sweat juice was the castile batch that I used more olive oil than extra virgin olive oil, whereas the other batches all used extra virgin olive oil. Someone tell me this is it so I can sleep without dreams of sweat-drenched bars of dancing soap.

 

[herbaliser]

Update: Cut the soap hours ago, put them in the cure area. Just took a look, and the soap is sweating again. It looks like a Gatorade commercial, but with soap.



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[kharmon320]

Unfortunately, the only way to know if it's the EVOO would be to do some side-by-side comparisons. I would do unscented, uncolored one batch with EVOO the other batch with regular olive oil. Having said that, if Extra Virgin costs more then I say dump it completely. Regular olive oil works just fine and is cheaper for me.

In the end, I think it's probably the awesomeness of your soap oozing magical sauce. :wink: Love that!

ETA: I don't use clays (yet) so maybe someone with more experience with clays could say whether that effects or not. Also, don't see the lye in your recipe. Maybe your superfat percentage is too high. Just some thoughts. It's strange to me that you would end up with spongy soap just by putting saran wrap on top. Have you put your recipe (including 5% extra grease) through SoapCalc or another lye calculator?

 

[Dragonkaz]

I have no idea what is causing this amazing oozing of magickal liquid ... but I do love the way you write! Welcome to our addiction and I hope you stay and post often!

 

[herbaliser]

Unfortunately, the only way to know if it's the EVOO would be to do some side-by-side comparisons. I would do unscented, uncolored one batch with EVOO the other batch with regular olive oil. Having said that, if Extra Virgin costs more then I say dump it completely. Regular olive oil works just fine and is cheaper for me.

In the end, I think it's probably the awesomeness of your soap oozing magical sauce. :wink: Love that!

ETA: I don't use clays (yet) so maybe someone with more experience with clays could say whether that effects or not. Also, don't see the lye in your recipe. Maybe your superfat percentage is too high. Just some thoughts. It's strange to me that you would end up with spongy soap just by putting saran wrap on top. Have you put your recipe (including 5% extra grease) through SoapCalc or another lye calculator?

Believe it or not, the extra virgin olive cost less, which is why I got some. Before this, I had pretty good success with pomace but it was a bit pricier so being the cheap skate that I am, I ordered 5L of EVOO.

David Fisher from about.com mentioned to me in an email one time that soap makers prefer the oil you mentioned (grade B?) or pomace, and that EVOO doesn't have extra benefits and is better used on food.

All the batches that I've had perspiration occur was made in the new soap mold I mentioned above. I think (but I'm not sure, because I was asleep) that parts of the batch shown in the picture managed to gel without a cover. I felt the bottom after 16 hours and it was still warm. The saran wrap was placed on top of the soap (right on top, sealed it good).

I use soapcalc for all my recipes; I'll edit my post and add in the lye + other things.

Taken this morning (~12 hours later):



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I'm going to apply speed stick if this continues.

 

[Cuckoo Bananas]

My soaps do that in the mould overnight sometimes too. After posting here I learned that it is sweating lye - I'm not 100% sure of this - it's just from talking about it here and when I have pH tested the little drops they are very alkaline. I wipe it off my soap with a bit of vinegar on paper towel and it has never come back after I have wiped it off and put it on the curing rack.

I can't for the life of me figure out why it happens sometimes but not always, so far the only real thing I can tell if how quickly I have used the stick blender - I did a few batches completely by hand stirring in the beginning and it didn't happen at all on any of those ones. Only seemed to crop up after I got going with the SB, I try and make sure I don't SB too quickly now but yeah - really miffed about it still.

 

[herbaliser]

My soaps do that in the mould overnight sometimes too. After posting here I learned that it is sweating lye - I'm not 100% sure of this - it's just from talking about it here and when I have pH tested the little drops they are very alkaline. I wipe it off my soap with a bit of vinegar on paper towel and it has never come back after I have wiped it off and put it on the curing rack.

I can't for the life of me figure out why it happens sometimes but not always, so far the only real thing I can tell if how quickly I have used the stick blender - I did a few batches completely by hand stirring in the beginning and it didn't happen at all on any of those ones. Only seemed to crop up after I got going with the SB, I try and make sure I don't SB too quickly now but yeah - really miffed about it still.

Do you ever use extra virgin olive oil in your recipes that do sweat?

I personally stick blend quite vigorously because I pretend I'm racing a motor boat. So I guess even if the lye and oils are combined at 100, by the time I'm done, the temperature must be way higher. I've never actually measured, but a lot of times I will put my hand against the pot to check--result is that it doesn't feel that hot.

Could this also be a very mild case of false trace?

 

[Cuckoo Bananas]

I usually use a bit of pomace olive oil, but it has also done it on batches where there has been no olive oil at all.

And yeah lol just experiment and see if you slow down the motor boat racing SB and see if it make any difference at all. I know it is painfully long but you could try one batch mixing it all by hand and then both of us would know if that is definitely what is causing it (you should do this not me seeming as I've paid my dues and mixed a few by hand already lol) Any with high OO will take forever to trace, but you can stir it for 15 minutes and then leave it for a while and then come back. I think my first ever castille I did all by hand and that one took about 30 hours to trace. Somehow that castille batch came out so much better than the ones I have done since with the SB (If I had the time and the patience I would lovingly hand stir all my batches).

Let us all know how you go with it if you do experiment a bit - I would love to know for sure if that is what is doing it.

 

[Fragola]

This happened to me for the first time a couple of days ago.

The story goes like this: I did a little color test (just checking a red and a yellow, swirled together). Next day, I noticed bloody zappy beads on top of my soap. Wiped them off, same goes on another day later. The third day, no beads and no zapping.

Btw, it was a cold, palmohemp bar. Hand stirred, it traced really fast.

The only difference to my previous recipes is the high water amount (close to yours - I often use half of that). So my guess is that this is actually water and that it could also relate somehow to atmospheric humidity.

By that reasoning, less water would reduce the sweating.

But I was wondering, why is this a problem ? I could notice no side effects.

Something else: I can't figure out why the yellow area was unaffected.

 

[herbaliser]

This happened to me for the first time a couple of days ago.

The story goes like this: I did a little color test (just checking a red and a yellow, swirled together). Next day, I noticed bloody zappy beads on top of my soap. Wiped them off, same goes on another day later. The third day, no beads and no zapping.

Btw, it was a cold, palmohemp bar. Hand stirred, it traced really fast.

The only difference to my previous recipes is the high water amount (close to yours - I often use half of that). So my guess is that this is actually water and that it could also relate somehow to atmospheric humidity.

By that reasoning, less water would reduce the sweating.

But I was wondering, why is this a problem ? I could notice no side effects.

Something else: I can't figure out why the yellow area was unaffected.

I've noticed a direct correlation of this sweat and soda ash appearance. It certainly could be water (or at least partly water) but the beady beads I wipe off of the soap is discolored to varying degrees.

This recent batch (the ones in the pictures) has cured for a few days and it's still sweating. One interesting thing to note is the scent is almost completely gone as far as I can tell, which hasn't happened before to the other sweaty slabs of soap I've made.

I believe the homer bird is right and that, not just using hand stirring, but having the soap trace in a steadier (and slower) fashion will eliminate said issues. I will of course try this, but right now I'm out of oils and won't be ordering for a while.

 

[Sunny]

I can't say why it's sweating, I haven't had that happen to me before. I usually have issues when I use food puree or use spiced FOs in my soap. It'll ooze or crack, get beads on it... Sometimes it overheats but still does not sweat like that normally. I have used all the same oils as you have and I always use a stick blender. It seems more like a humidity/water issue but I just can't say for sure.

every time I read a post by you, I think of this:

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMqayQ-U74s&ob=av3n"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMqayQ-U74s&ob=av3n[/ame]

herbaliser, herbal herbaliser, you're an herbaliser, oh!

sorry bout that

 

[Fragola]

the beady beads I wipe off of the soap is discolored to varying degrees.

Gentler wiping may prevent color change. I actually used an earstick on mine - barely touching the soap, and the color remained virtually unchanged.

 

[herbaliser]

the beady beads I wipe off of the soap is discolored to varying degrees.

Gentler wiping may prevent color change. I actually used an earstick on mine - barely touching the soap, and the color remained virtually unchanged.

For some reason, every time you post it doesn't send me an email.

My wording was a bit strange, but the beads that are wiped off have color (like on the thing I wipe it off with--paper towels in this case), not a discoloration of the soap. The color is usually light yellow to dark brown. The soaps seem to be fine albeit a bit drying, could just need more cure time. I wish I could CSI this and find out what it really is.

@tasha, I'm thinking of making a music video to promote my soap. I believe the key to effective soap advertisement is revealing packaging. Sooo I took some time and came up with a few new labels, thought I might swing it by here first for a test run.



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Here we have the classic cigar band that everyone is familiar with. My personal favorite; very simple and effective. Everything is blurred because I don't actually sell soap, so when someone stumbles upon this site and sees this and falls into a mixed state of awe and stupor and wants to buy it and tries to google for me, it'll turn up blank, just like this picture.

This label was solely created for the purpose of me pretending to actually sell soap and make enough money doing so to afford fancy labeling.



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Here we have the more revealing 2 piece label for a more risque approach. This will definitely increase sales, or put you out of business.



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Finally, you can go commando, but I think that would be too embarassing (for the soap). So here we have the S string, or soap string.

 

[Stinkydancer]

LMAO! Nice I love the Bikini!

I'm wondering if it isn't just Glycerin.

Do these soaps zap at all?

I have had this happen to me as well but it's with soaps I have put in the freezer. I take them out bring them to room temp and bam- these little beads for a few days. After they dry up- I get- guess what?- ASH!

I just stopped using the freezer for milk soaps or any soaps for that matter.

Other than Glycerin or extreme humidity- not sure what it could be.

 

[herbaliser]

LMAO! Nice I love the Bikini!

I'm wondering if it isn't just Glycerin.

Do these soaps zap at all?

I have had this happen to me as well but it's with soaps I have put in the freezer. I take them out bring them to room temp and bam- these little beads for a few days. After they dry up- I get- guess what?- ASH!

I just stopped using the freezer for milk soaps or any soaps for that matter.

Other than Glycerin or extreme humidity- not sure what it could be.

When I have time, and hopefully money, I'll buy some glycerin, rub it on my soap, let it dry, and see what happens.

They (the beads) either don't zap or I was born with an extra manly tongue. Probably not the latter. It feels like a very light oil (not oily enough to be oil and not watery enough to be water) and it smells rather indifferent--a slight hint of...something.

This is the only soap problem I'm having so far that occurs constantly. Sure it doesn't 'ruin' soap, but I hate cutting off the top because that's the nicest part. It's like cutting the top off of a muffin. Soda ash is like bird poop on your car; it's not the end of the world but it's certainly not a good beginning. It's right up there with DOS, although DOS is a bit more sinister in nature.

 

[Stinkydancer]

I agree with you- 100%. It kills me to cut off tops. I hope you get down to the bottom of it.

It could just be glycerin but why it would only do it on one batch is weird. Gotta love the soap gremlins.