Recent content by Ryan

I need to get some palm kernel flakes, they will be a good addition to cocoa butter to harden the bars some more.

I don't know if she uses a water softener. I don't think she does. We do not live in the same district, a few hundred miles apart. I am pretty sure we have hard water here because we used an electric kettle to boil water for coffee and tea & after the water cools again there are little white...

My MIL loved the soap, it wasn't to drying on her skin. I also gave some to my mom. When I tried it at her house it lathered much better than it did at my house. I am guessing this is due to water hardness.... Or it may just seem that way because I ran out of the soap at my house & began using a...

Thanks! I asked my wife but didn't get a good answer about skin sensitivity, just that it needs to be unscented and she normally uses dove. 5% SF. They will be here at the end of December for a while so she can try it out here before she takes all of it. This is assuming 8 weeks is a long...

Welcome!

I have lots of links I can share with varying info. I am a beginner and I would suggest soaking up all the info from this forum as you can. There are lots of incredibly knowledgeable people here and they don't mind sharing much of their info. I have found that many soap makers aren't as sharing...

This is what it seems to be for the experienced SOAPERS!!. They have a set combo (lard, palm, castor, something) or (coco, olive, palm, castor something) if we make enough we may find our favorite too. Like you said, take the advice and try a little here and there. I'll try a lard soap next...

I have heard that any combination of soaps with a (Linoleic +Linolenic ) total of over 15 you significantly increase your chances of DOS. Is this true? I don't know... here is the source https://www.modernsoapmaking.com/the-most-popular-fatty-acid-profiles-in-soapmaking/ If this is true...

I need a little more diversity with my hard oils. I was afraid of using too many hard oils or butters together for some reason. I saw the suggested %'s (per oil) and figured the butters/flakes would have a compounding effect and make the bar brittle or something. I unmolded and cut yesterday...

Exactly. You would lose product & be messy. I have thought about readily available ways to cut a loaf easily without buying a cutter. I saw an HEB worker cutting cheese one day, with a string/wire & thought soap could be cut like that. I would just need to create an anchor point for the wire...

I'm not too familiar with design nomenclature. I just alternated pouring long ways into the mold & zig zagged short ways across the mold. With the stirring stick, i put it in about 2 inches and zig zagged long ways, short then long again. If any of this is making sense, lol.... hard to put into...

The colors seem to be blended together too much. Maybe my stir stick design for the top went too deep?

Thanks for all the replies :) Yes, the first is avocado oil. I didn't know the acronym for castor oil so I spelled out the rest. Since I don't have tons of experience trying out many different combinations and % of oils I try to go off of the diaper calc. And the oils I have available. I...

AO - 5% Castor Oil - 5% Cocoa Butter - 15% Coconut Oil - 25% Hemp Seed Oil - 5% Olive Oil - 10% Palm Oil 35% No scent. (For mother in law, if it turns out well) First time mixing colors, 3x larger than the first batches. 455 g of 50/50 lye solution + 195 g distilled water to reach 35% lye...