SimpleSoapsnSalts
Member
Well, I had my first encounter with aluminum and lye.
My sister and I were making up an 18 lb batch of Cinnamon Oatmeal with half Goat milk lye solution. I saw a good tip from somewhere online that you can run your lye/milk through a strainer to get out the few curds the sometimes form. Well, right before we went to pour the lye/milk in the oils I remembered and grabbed our "metal" strainer. I'm totally familiar with what havoc aluminum can do, as we work with milk in cheese making all the time; and so I've been real careful to never get close to aluminum when working with soap. So, I didn't even think when I started pouring the lye through an ALUMINUM strainer. It started foamy and hissing, after we got almost all the lye poured through. I was really afraid we had ruined a huge batch of soap when it wouldn't come to a trace as usual. But it did! We did our first swirl and it looks great!
Soapy Happy,
CW
My sister and I were making up an 18 lb batch of Cinnamon Oatmeal with half Goat milk lye solution. I saw a good tip from somewhere online that you can run your lye/milk through a strainer to get out the few curds the sometimes form. Well, right before we went to pour the lye/milk in the oils I remembered and grabbed our "metal" strainer. I'm totally familiar with what havoc aluminum can do, as we work with milk in cheese making all the time; and so I've been real careful to never get close to aluminum when working with soap. So, I didn't even think when I started pouring the lye through an ALUMINUM strainer. It started foamy and hissing, after we got almost all the lye poured through. I was really afraid we had ruined a huge batch of soap when it wouldn't come to a trace as usual. But it did! We did our first swirl and it looks great!
Soapy Happy,
CW