Thoughts and feelings on RTCP soapmaking?

[dieSpinne]

SO I have been watching a LOT of YouTube lately, and I keep seeing entries for RTCP (Room Temp Cold Process) where all the oils and the lye are at room temperature instead of the usual 135.

Thoughts? Feelings? Experiences?

I am curious about this because I want to know how one does this with a blend that has hard oils in it without having it turn a false trace.

 

[judymoody]

I don't use this method for precisely the same reason you mention - solidifying hard oils. I generally soap somewhere between 95-110.

However, I once had my ingredients cool down more than usual and got false trace. I hand stirred/whisked the mixture, the lye began reacting with the oils and the temperature went up and the mixture thinned out. Then I stick blended as usual. Came out fine. But I only did this once - maybe somebody with more direct experience will chime in.

 

[carebear]

I didn't know 135 was usual. That is really hot, in my experience.

I used room temp oils and lye for a long time - it gave me time to mess around, swirl, etc. Now that I use a high hard oils formula, though, I prefer to soap with both warm to encourage gel. WARM. 120ish. 135 is far above what I would soap.

This said, there are actually two definitions of RTCP. Some say it's everything at room temp. Others define it as oils & butters at room temp (NOT melted), and piping hot fresh lye solution which, when added to the oils and butters, melts them.

 

[Araseth]

I get confused about RTCP, I see different methods. I hear the lye solution is just made and is so hot that it melts the solid oils. And then I hear this method where the solution is cool. I've never used either method, would like to hear more about it too.

 

[dieSpinne]

OK... so experience speaks louder than books... 135 is too hot... that would explain why my recent soaps are setting up faster than I can pour them.

Thus far, all of the RTCP I have seen on YouTube involve both oils and lye at room temperature... I can see why one would want the hot lye, though, for the harder oils.

Thank you again for the temperature tip... keeping it below 120 will actually make this process a little easier... though I am curious about how one gets one's soaps to gel at those temperatures.... Perhaps I am simply making my batches too small to get a good gel at the temps you work at... I can barely get gel at 135.

 

[carebear]

What size batches are you working with?

You can always add heat - heating pads, hot bricks, the oven...
And insulate - wooden mold, towels, fleece blanket...

 

[dieSpinne]

Thus far I have done 1/2 kilo batches... most of them fit into a single mold... one had about a guest-bar worth of leftover after filling the mold. Thus far, the best gel I have gotten was in a slab mold... the single bar molds have been hit and miss...

 

[carebear]

Right - single bar molds will need added heat. Set them on a heating pad or the like. Or stack a bunch of them in a cooler.

 

[Soapy Gurl]

I sometimes use this method, it isnt good for winter months. I make my lye solution and combine my oils. I use a lot of hard oils so I combine everything and put them into the oven on warm. Once they are all combined I pull them out. I wait until they cool down before soaping, sometimes the next day. They don't harden back up once they are melted and stirred together. Sometimes I combine when everything is warm, but the room temp. method has worked great. I think the false trace happens when the oils are too cold, such as in winter.

 

[Midnight Rowan]

In summertime I can soap with nothing above 85 (lye and oils), but in the winter, I've still had success with keeping everything just under 100 degrees. No false trace yet *knock on wood*.

 

[soapbuddy]

I use beeswax, which won't work with RTCP. I soap at around 110 degrees.

 

[IrishLass]

I use a high % of hard fats, so I soap warm around 120-ish (degreesF), and occassionally warmer if I happened to have let my fats heat a tad bit longer than I normally do- around 130 -135 degreesf. My formula is such, though, that it does fine whether soaped warm or hot. I even soaped it at 160 degreesF one day a couple of years ago, but that was an anomoly. I got overly distracted by something (probably posting on the forum! :wink: ). The soap came out perfectly fine, though. That probably would not have been the case, though, if that particular formula was high in heat sensitive oils.

IrishLass

 

[xyxoxy]

Most of my recipes use a high % of hard oils. I like to melt them over a VERY low heat just until they turn clear. I then add room temp pre-mixed lye solution. The temp is usually 110-115 (never above 120).

One of the reasons I like this method is that I usually don't gel so I like to keep the temp as low as possible.
I almost never need to use my SB to reach trace.

 

[ikindred]

I used to soap at 100 degrees but now I soap at room temperature and to be honest, I have never had a problem with false trace. I normally heat my oils and mix my lye and let them both sit for about 3 hours and then mix and blend......no problems yet. After I had that horrible soap volcano one time, I started soaping this way!

 

[Moonblossom]

I usually always use RT lye and warmed oils works great for me, I was soaping way too hot and decided to try this, so far no issues. I only make 1-2 LBS at a time though.

 

[dieSpinne]

OK, so I tried it with Castile (apparently, that is my "Go-to" soap at the moment...).

1000g EVOO
300 g H2O
128g NaOH

Combine the Lye and water... add warm lye to rt oil... oil got warm (surprise!)

Trace was fairly quick, though not insane. I poured into my usual OO molds and they are sitting and being left alone for now.

THIS time I am a lot less paranoid about whether I did it right or not.
THIS time I know that Castile can take as much as a week to become unmoldable.
THIS time I will check it once a day every day or two, but will not obsess and check every hour or two.

Thank you all for your help on this... so far they have a beautiful creamy appearance, but are still at thick trace. I have them sitting in a plastic tub with plenty of air circulation but not a lot of "exposure" (I don't want dust and dirt in the soap).

 

[judymoody]

I'm glad this method seems to have worked for you.

To cut down on cure time for Castille, I recommend a water discount next time.

 

[dieSpinne]

How much of a discount do you recommend, Judymoody?
I went from 38% to 30% of original oil weight.
I have heard of people going as low as a 50/50 lye solution, but I had a hard time getting the lye dissolved with THIS concentration... I am not sure how people manage to get the 50/50 solutions dissolved to clear.

 

[Bukawww]

I only ever soap at RT. I hated having to babysit my oils and lye water (not to mention FUSS with my lye water at all...the less I have to go near that stuff, the better lol).

I also use a very high percentage of hard oils and have not had any issues...yet, of course. I do live in the desert and our winters are fairly mild thank goodness.

 

[IrishLass]

I have heard of people going as low as a 50/50 lye solution, but I had a hard time getting the lye dissolved with THIS concentration... I am not sure how people manage to get the 50/50 solutions dissolved to clear.

This is what I do when I make my 50/50 masterbatch of lye solution. I weigh out just a touch more water than my lye because the heat that's generated from mixing the two causes slight evaporation, making it less than a 1:1 ratio.

I learned to do this during my first masterbatch in which I weighed everything from beginning to end (container and all). In the process, I figured out that my water loss from the heat reaction came to 6 grams worth, i.e., it weighed 6 grams less than it should have (I just added 6 grams of water back in to compensate and all went well).

The size of my 50/50 masterbatch is a little over 4 lbs. worth, so as a result of my first experience, I now weigh out 2 lbs 3.3 oz (or 1002 grams) of lye. And then I weigh out 2 lbs 3.6 oz (or 1008 grams) of water- a 6 grams excess. In the end, right when I get done mixing, I weigh my finished solution to see if it all adds up correctly (the weight should be 2004 grams if all went well). If it comes up short (which has never happened [yet] with my subsequent masterbatches), I would just add more water at this time to equal 2004 grams, but so far, all has gone well and it weighs out 2004 grams - an even 1:1 ratio. When I go to weigh the solution later, after it has cooled off, it's still 2004 grams (I cover mixing container as soon as I'm done mixing). I then pour my solution out of my mixing container through a fine mesh strainer into my 'permanent' lye solution container. In the end, my solution is crystal clear.


IrishLass