First attempt at CP possible fail

[Candle Guy]

Hey everyone hope all is well? Ok I attempted to make my first batch of CP soap today. I added everything that the Bastille recipe called for but wound up with a very watery batter. My first issue I realized is that when I added Lye to the recommended amount of water it did not heat up past 90 degrees. I went with it anyways! I heated my oils and let them cool to 130. At this point my lye water was at room temp. I mixed the lye water and oils together and used my SB and hand stirred as well for over 15 minutes but I could not reach trace. I added my fragrance and dye and continued with both the SB and hand stirring but just couldn't get trace. I decided to just pour into the mold. So now I have a very watery batter in my mold. Any idea where I may have gone wrong? I am guessing too much water even though I added to the exact measurements? Also the sodium hydroxide was a new bottle from a reputable vendor.

 

[cmzaha]

You would need to post your recipe for any of us to troubleshoot. Did you run this recipe through a lye calc to check the numbers? Unfortunately recipes can be written incorrectly or it may just contain high water.

 

[Candle Guy]

Here is the recipe

 

[Candle Guy]

When I ran it through soap calc it had 38% water from the start. I am thinking maybe I should drop to around 30% or around there for water?

 

[Jersey Girl]

That’s a lot of water for a high concentration of soft oil. Understandable that it would be loose and take a long time to trace and set up in mold. Most folks here use lye concentration instead of water as percentage of oils. The sweet spot is 33% but you could probably go a bit higher with 75% OO.

 

[Candle Guy]

So are you saying to drop the water percentage to 33%?

 

[Jersey Girl]

So are you saying to drop the water percentage to 33%?

use lye concentration. 33% is what most people use but depending on how many soft oils you use you can adjust it. Increasing the percentage means less water is used. Decreasing means more water.

 

[Candle Guy]

Thank you and I will check that out. Prob try again tomorrow

 

[penelopejane]

Here is the recipe

I agree that lye concentration is a better metric to use and yes you could go to 31% lye concentration.
See attached soap calc pdf that show you both.
However, even with that amount of water your recipe should have been fine and worked.
Where did you get the sodium hydroxide from? Is it 100% sodium hydroxide?
It is a bit of a red flag that it didn't heat up.
Are you sure your scales are measuring correctly?
What type of "dye" did you use?
Where did you buy the fragrance oil you used?
How much FO did you use?
How much soap did you actually make?

 

[Candle Guy]

I agree that lye concentration is a better metric to use and yes you could go to 31% lye concentration.
See attached soap calc pdf that show you both.
However, even with that amount of water your recipe should have been fine and worked.
Where did you get the sodium hydroxide from? Is it 100% sodium hydroxide?
It is a bit of a red flag that it didn't heat up.
Are you sure your scales are measuring correctly?
What type of "dye" did you use?
Where did you buy the fragrance oil you used?
How much FO did you use?
How much soap did you actually make?
View attachment 45611

I bought all of my supplies from Natures Garden. I also made 2 lbs using a total of 1 ounce of luxury lavender fragrance oil. I used a purple liquid dye and my scale is definitively right.

 

[penelopejane]

It should have worked. May be it needed to be SB for longer.

 

[shunt2011]

Couple of recommendations. Don't just follow someone's recipe without running it through a lye calculator yourself to verify correct measurements. I also recommend making 1 lb batches until you get the hang of it to save yourself from wasting ingredients that can be costly.
With that much OO in the recipe it will take time for it to trace with as much liquid you used.

I agree there may be something wrong with the lye regardless of where you bought it. It should get much hotter than 90 degrees.

Lastly, you don't need your oils that hot. 130 it way too hot. They just need to be warm and clear.

 

[Candle Guy]

Update: I am a go getter so I already switched the recipe around according to everyone's suggestions and thank you all. I just made a batch already this morning. I used the soap calc as suggested and switched the lye concentration to 31% to start with. Amazingly the lye heated up this time lmao? It was heating to around 160ish. I hurried up and heated the oils to around 125. The lye dropped to around 123 so I mixed them together. It only took like 2 minutes to trace and the consistency was a nice batter. So I poured into the mold with a 1 LB batch. It looks like every video I have watched so crossing fingers. I covered it with plastic wrap and a towel.

 

[Megan]

If using lavender luxury, I would recommend not insulating. That fragrance has a tendency to heat up and if you insulate, it may crack on top. I would definitely babysit it if insulated and check that it isn't getting too hot. If it starts to get much higher than 160F I would recommend getting it in the fridge/freezer.

 

[DeeAnna]

Glad your second try worked better!

I agree with the others that you're going to get more consistent results in your soap making if you start using lye concentration or water:lye ratio rather than "water as % of lye." Lye concentration and water:lye ratio look different, but they are mathematically have the same meaning, so pick whichever one makes more sense to you and stick with it. "Water as % of lye" is a mathematically different property.

Temps around 125F would be a little on the warm side for my preference, but that temp is still within a reasonable range for general soap making. I normally stick with temps around 100-105F.

 

[Candle Guy]

Thank you that is great info.

 

[SmockingRN]

i really enjoyed reading this soap adventure story! And when you described being a go-getter, I wanted to jump up and make a batch of soap, too. Very inspirational .

 

[Candle Guy]

Thank you Smocking and go get you some lol.