Search results

Sounds like you are making container candles? Paraffin is typically used in stand alone pillar candles. It does shrink after setting which makes it easier to get out of the pillar mold. You should be using soy wax or a soy/paraffin blend for container candles.

The .4 is actually an approximate conversion factor of any volume in cubic inches, to ounces of oils for that volume of soap. The total ounces will be the oils plus the lye and water, but Soapcalc will tell you this exactly, depending on things like superfatting and lye/water ratio. Some chemist...

Yes, but this article is still out there for people to stumble across, and the webpage has a 2012 copy right on it. Although there is no date on the article itself. The point was, if it is out there they should maintain it or take it down. However, there seems to be no way to contact them.

UPDATE I guess I won't contact them. The email address above, and about 10 others I tried, were all rejected. In fact there is no "contact us" information anywhere that I could find on the Life123 website. I guess they really do not want any feedback. ;-)

Never tried that one, probably because we often are doing multicolor and that would not work well. ;-) We have often added TD (for whitening) to the lye water when we have an FO that tends to discolor. Getting colors the way you want them is usually a very difficult art.

Ditto Fragola and IrishLass. In fact we do most of ours RTCP (Room Temperature Cold Process) to slow it down. This is especially helpful if you plan to do a lot of fancy multicolor swirling in your slab or log mold. You need all the time you can get between pouring at a light trace, and doing...

Good point. I will write them.

I actually do not see an issue with the wooden spoon. I have used wood myself, although I prefer plastic or stainless steel. It is aluminum that is an issue, because it will react with lye. I do see different issues. They do not make it clear that you use the 5 oz of distilled water with the...

Not sure how this works either. The rule of thumb I have always seen is L X W X D (or the volume) in inches multiplied by .4. So I get the divide by 16.39 to convert cubic centimeters to cubic inches, but don't understand the convert to ounces at all. A one cubic inch volume of water...

Yes, you calculate the volume of your mold(s) times 0.4, and that is the total oil weight you enter into soapcalc. I am not certain, but believe it is the 0.4 times the volume that takes into account that you will be adding water and lye. By magic or whatever, it seems to work. :D

Hijack was my fault. :roll: Good luck with the new product line. :D

I had to Google that one Ian. :D And yes this is absurd. They are opening up Pandora's box, and yes she is starting to go after anyone she thinks is violating it. This is a trademark that is likely to be reversed, once she attacks enough people and they band together to challenge this.

On a side note, someone applied for and was granted a trademark for the combined words "tooth soap". I cannot understand what the Patent And Trademark Office is thinking, by granting TM's to commonly used descriptive terms like this. I'm thinking I should trademark "tooth whitener" and then go...

Ditto KrissyB on the TD. We add titanium dioxide to our lye mixture, along with a pinch of silk fiber, as a general rule. The exception would be if we're going for some shade of green.

No. The zap test is literally touching the soap to your tongue to see if it zaps you. It's like touching a 9 volt smoke alarm battery to your tongue, you get a little zap. If the soap zaps your tongue, the saponification process did not convert all of the lye. If it just taste like soap, it's...

Here is a post ( http://soapmakingforum.com/forum/viewto ... 980#128980 ) I made from a few months back about using tubing. We do it because it's cheap (1/2 cent per bar), but the bans are a lot less trouble (about 5 cents). We (actually DW Billie) also made a short video if you're interested...

This is probably not much help, but we love the micas. And there are pop and floresent mica colors that are just wonderful. Since we are hobbyist and not a business, we are not too concerned about consistent colors from one batch to the next, so we don't really measure. We just premix a little...

I would do a zap test first just to make sure all the lye is gone. If not you may need to rebatch again (cook it some more) and maybe add a little oil/fat (try about 5% of batch weight). If no zap, it will probably just take several weeks for all the extra water to dry out. Be patient. :)...

OK, now that's pretty cool. :D So the next question is, how can we get our hands on your spreadsheet? :P

Beautiful soaps. Very nice work and great photos. :)