stearic acid

I would love to pick you soapers brains. I tried to make my first shave soap today, and it was a disaster. My recipe has 45% stearic acid, dual lye 60/40. I usually make cp soap, so this was a whole new experience for me. I don't like stearic acid, the high melt point puts me off lol. First off...

I've been watching a lot of video's lately hoping to learn what I might be doing wrong etc. I've been watching Valerie Mosher a lot and noticed that she adds sugar and salt to the lye water at the beginning of her batch, then adds sugar, maple syrup and ACV at the end after the cook. Why does...

Hi there I hope you can help me. I have searched for hours on the internet and I cannot find a definitive answer. Can you add stearic acid to Ecosoya Pillar Blend wax? I would like to make some soy pillar candles (quite tall 20cm high x 7.5cm wide) and I want to make sure that I will get a...

Hi folks, I branched into candles (yup, another newbie). I do wicked and wickless candles for the kinky crowd (wickless candles go in water baths or are melted with heat guns). (It's a TON of fun. Think pedicures with paraffin wax, only this is all over your whole body... ^_^) I have a soy...

Hello! First off, I want to say that I LOVE Irishlass' GLS recipe and have been using it faithfully. I was just reading a different thread and see that some of you add Stearic Acid to your GLS. Can I add it now that it has been diluted? And if so, should i melt it in a separate container and...

I was looking for something to harden up a bar other than bees wax. Soap calc lists Stearic Acid as one of the hardest. If I buy it from here. it looks like it's cheaper than the bees wax I was using. Has anyone used straight Stearic Acid before in their recipes and have any feed back on it?

Looking at ordering one or the other - do you have a preference? What is the main difference between the two in terms of hardness, pros & cons? I have never used anything for a harder bar so would love a bit of insight between the two! Thanks guys!

Okay, so I was making an experimental batch of shaving soap. In the soap was about 30% Tallow, 20% lard and oils such as grape, olive and 76F coconut oil. I also put in a good amount of stearic acid and some clay for the slip. My lye was sodium hydroxide and I got the oils down to about...

I am new to this great hobby and am wondering if there is a preference between stearic acid and sodium lactate to make soap a bit harder? Thanks!

Hey all, I was pretty excited to try out a new formulation of what I thought was going to be a great shave HP soap. However, once I combined the lye solution with the oil mix, the entire mixture immediately siezed and turned grainy. I tried to keep it on the heat with hopes that it would melt...

I want to make soap on a rope and need my soaps to be harder. When I'm in Soap Calc do I just decrease some of the Olive Oil and Coconut Oil and add those amounts to the stearic acid so it adds up to 100%.? My recipe is basic. I SF with Castor. I think I use 1T of the Stearic per pound of oils...