Gel Phase?

[Deborah Long]

Hi, new to the forum and rather new to soap making and brand spanking new at making CP soap. I've been making M&P for about 1 1/2 years now and decided it was time to make the leap into CP. I've found that the new SLS free formulations of m&p soap just don't lather well (so my hubby says).
Yesterday was my first batch of CP - sooo much fun and much easier than I ever thought it would be. I used a basic recipe that I found at Brambleberry and added 2 oz of Cedarwood EO to the mix. Here's the rest of the recipe:
8 oz. Coconut Oil (24%)
15 oz. Olive Oil (44%)
11 oz. Palm Oil (32%)
4.8 oz. Lye
11.2 oz. Distilled Water
Everything was going fine until I added my EO. Immediately the mixture went to trace! I quickly finished, poured it in my mold and set it aside to cool.
Imagine my shock when I set my filled mold down and almost the entire thing had reached gel phase, just that quickly! I kinda freaked out, since I have no clue what 'gel phase' truly is, or how to deal with it! lol
24 hours later, my soap is firm enough to cut.
My question is - since I ended up with a small crack on the top, if I had put it on a heating pad or wrapped it, would the crack have disappeared completely? It did end up shrinking a little bit. I have soap that has a huge 'other colored' circle in the middle, but I'm sure it will be safe to use...
Another question - what - exactly - is gel phase and is it good or bad?
Thanks so much for all of your help! This forum is awesome!
Deb

 

[shunt2011]

Hello and welcome to the forum. What did you use to scent it? Sometimes fragrance is a heater. What temps did you soap at. Gel is the saponification process. Looks like you got partial gel. Just a cosmetic thing and it should fade some with cure. The soap cracked because it got too hot. Insulating it would have likely made it worse. It looks good though. Congratulations!

 

[Lin19687]

Did you check on the amount of EO that was safe to use on the skin ?

I am not sure but that seems like a lot of that EO for a 34oz batch.

I thought it was around 0.50 ppo for that, That could be what happened

 

[Deborah Long]

The EO I used was Cedarwood. I tried to find out if it would affect anything online and didn't see anything that alarmed me. I used a fragrance calculator and used the middle setting so it wouldn't be too strong and it doesn't smell too strong to me...
When I combined my oils and lye water the lye was at 124 and the oils were at 120. Too hot??

 

[cmzaha]

I use several different types of Cedarwood and never had any overheat or trace quickly. I would be very suspicious if it is actually Cedarwood EO. Where did you purchase it? I use Cedarwood EO at the rate of 1 oz per lb of oil (ppo)

 

[shunt2011]

Yes, probably soaping too warm. I soap with my oils warmed until just clear and lye is room temp. Try soaping a bit cooler 110. You may find it works much better. I've not used Cedarwood (sorry missed that in your first post). No help there.

 

[DeeAnna]

Gel phase is neither bad nor good. It just is.

All "gel" means is the soap contains sufficient water and has gotten warm enough to turn into a sticky semi-liquid. It's more or less the same thing as ice melting into water.

The crack is caused by the soap over-expanding from the warmth, a little like muffins or banana bread cracking on the top during baking. Although cracks on muffins are okay, cracks on soap are less desirable.

Whether you want your soap to go into gel is up to you. Some people like their soap to gel, others don't.

Your recipe uses a 30% lye concentration (this is not water as % of oils). Try raising the lye concentration to 33% if you want to reduce the chance of gelling.

Also, as the others have suggested, you might want to soap a wee bit cooler to prevent overheating and thus preventing cracks. If you take temps, try to get your soap batter in the 95-105 F range. I get that when the fats are just melted until clear and the lye is at warmish room temp. If you don't take temps, the soap batter should feel just pleasantly warm to the hand when you put it on the side of your soap pot.

Unless you keep your house really cold with the AC, you may not need to insulate your soap at all, whether or not you want the soap to gel. I generally don't ever insulate my soap in the warmer months and I live in Iowa, not Arizona.

 

[Deborah Long]

Wow - okay, I bought my Cedarwood at a local soap place - AZ Soap Supply. I love the smell!

I *do* use a thermometer, but dang - it took so long for my lye concentration to cool down that I got really impatient. Any tips on cooling that down? Can I stick it in the fridge for a couple minutes?

I had to re-heat my oils, since I read that lye and oils should be within 10 degrees of each other... Lye took forever to cool down, oils had to heat up! lol That was actually my longest wait!

Thanks for everyone's help! I really appreciate it!

 

[amd]

I had to re-heat my oils, since I read that lye and oils should be within 10 degrees of each other... Lye took forever to cool down, oils had to heat up! lol That was actually my longest wait!

They don't actually need to be within 10° of each other. It's a recommendation given to new soapmakers [I think] to help control the soapmaking process while still learning. Before I started masterbatching my lye, I used fresh lye solution with room temperature oils - room temp being in the 65 - 75 range and my lye water was probably running about 180. It still makes soap! If you feel you have a good handle on the process, and not using a new recipe, additives, or FO, you could use the lye water at whatever temp. I would caution though if your oils are hot to not do it that way, and let your oils cool down - I would think under 100 would be safe to try this with. Adding hot hot lye to hot hot oils could cause unsafe volcanoes - or what I like to call "soap-plosions".

 

[Deborah Long]

Ahhh - gotcha! Well, since this was my first batch, next time I will not reheat my oils and let my lye cool down a little and see what happens!
Thanks for all of your help!

 

[dixiedragon]

Congrats on your soap! Looks good! In the future if you see that crack developing, you can give it a stir. That will break up the "crust" on top of the soap, and let some heat escape, and you also won't have a crack in the top!

 

[DeeAnna]

@Deborah Long -- There are faster ways than cooling it in the fridge. Try putting a few ice cubes in a bowl of water and resting your lye container in this ice bath. Stir the lye solution a bit. That will get it cooler faster. (And will be safer -- I worry about someone grabbing a container of lye solution thinking it's water or just accidentally spilling it. Hazardous chemicals don't ever belong in the refrigerator, IMO.)

@dixiedragon -- The times my soap has cracked, it's been firmish enough at that point that stirring would make more of a mess than the crack. There's no crust with liquid underneath -- instead it has a consistency like Jello that has set. I know it's in gel, but it's still not really liquidy. I just live with the crack.

 

[cmzaha]

Maybe I missed the answer, but is it Cedarwood Fragrance Oil, or Essential Oil. I have had Cedarwood Fragrance Oil overheat, but never Essential oil

ETA: Think I found the answer it looks to be EO, but does not state what type of Cedarwood

 

[Deborah Long]

@dixiedragon - I think by the time the crack formed it was too firm - I agree with DeeAnna on that. And thanks! I was kinda proud for the first time and all! I definitely will be doing more and correcting some of the things I did (like mixing too hot!).

@DeeAnna - Good point about the fridge thing! I agree now that I think about it. I'll try an ice bath...

 

[lenarenee]

Just an FYI, soap can overheat to the point that it volcanoes - (expand/crawl out of its container). Maker sure nothing important is nearby on the counter or fridge. I had a batch overheat so much that it "grew" right before my eyes- but stopped before spilling and settled back to normal when it cooled. That was.... entertaining.

 

[Deborah Long]

@lenarenee -- grew in the mold? AFTER you were done with mixing?? dang! (laughing at entertaining...lol)

 

[Alfa_Lazcares]

Here A picture of ricing, volcanos, separating, overheating
https://www.soapmakingforum.com/ind...ing,-volcanos,-separating,-overheating.52097/


Some pictures of the things soap can do...

 

[Deborah Long]

@Alfa_Lazcares Wow - those pictures are just amazing! Look at all the things I get to look forward to!

@cmzaha - The Cedarwood is an essential oil not fragrance oil. There are different types of Cedarwood? (DOH!) (laughing at myself)

 

[OBI IJEOMA]

Pls what is EO and can lye be added to MP

 

[shunt2011]

Pls what is EO and can lye be added to MP

EO=Essential Oil
No, you cannot add lye to MP soap. It already has lye in it. Welcome to the forum. Please be sure to read all the stickies and introduce yourself. Also, you may want to start a new thread in the appropriate forum going forward so you get quicker answers.