How much water is 'full water'?

[KiwiMoose]

I always use the 'lye concentration' option in the soap calculators. I usually soap with a 30% lye concentration. The resulting amount of water is what the calculator says it should be.

How might I manipulate the amount of water, yet still keep the same lye concentration?

Eg: I use 1000g of oils, and the calculator says I need 136g of lye and 318g water. Can I just use the same amount of lye and add MORE water? How much water would I add before it became what people call 'full water'?

Signed,
Confused from New Zealand

 

[penelopejane]

Full water is 26% lye concentration.
In a 100% Almond oil recipe that would be 172g of water.
At 30% lye concentration the same recipe would have 139g of water.

The amount of lye stays the same for both lye concentrations.

 

[KiwiMoose]

Thanks PJ - and that’s for 500g oils?

 

[penelopejane]

It was for 450g of oils. Best thing to do is play with a soap calc and write the variables down and see what changing the lye concentration or super fat etc does to the lye etc.

The amount of water doesn’t change much between 30% or 31% lye concentration but it makes a BIG difference.

Also, always use the same soap calc because they all vary a little bit. my soap calc 31% lye concentration is equal to other soap calcs 32% lye concentration.

 

[DeeAnna]

...How might I manipulate the amount of water, yet still keep the same lye concentration?

...Can I just use the same amount of lye and add MORE water? How much water would I add before it became what people call 'full water'?

PenelopeJane has given you good advice. To add my 2 cents worth --

The weight of the fats, the kinds of fats (coconut, olive, etc.), and the superfat percentage are the things that fix the weight of NaOH.

If you change the fats, the NaOH weight will change.
If the fats stay the same, the NaOH weight stays the same.​

Once you fix the superfat and the kinds and weights of the fats, you know the NaOH weight. Then you can adjust the amount of water.

Lye concentration (or water:lye ratio or "water as % of oils") is what changes the water amount. It does NOTHING else except to change the water.​

If you change the amount of water, the lye concentration (or water:lye ratio or "water as % of oils") HAS to change.​

***

Full water does not have one widely-accepted meaning. This is why I really don't like to use it, as well as the related term "water discount".

PenelopeJane has provided her definition of full water -- 26% lye concentration. Well respected soap makers and widely used soap calculators use these alternatives --

28% lye concentration
25% lye concentration (Modern Soap Making)
30% lye concentration (SummerBeeMeadow calc)
38% water as % of oils. This setting causes the lye concentration to range from about 25% to 33% depending on the fats in the recipe. (SoapCalc and others)​

On SMF, I'd say the most commonly used definitions of "full water" are 28% lye concentration (a fair number of experienced soap makers) and 38% water as % of oils (almost everyone else).

Even if we stick to these two definitions, they don't remotely agree with each other. That makes "full water" and "water discount" meaningless.

So pick your poison, as they say.

 

[KiwiMoose]

Thanks PJ and DeeAnna for you explanations. I often come back to revisit this question (as you may have noticed) because every so often when i start pondering it I get confused all over again.

 

[IrishLass]

So pick your poison, as they say.

Exactly! Pick your poison. lol My personal 'full water' amount equates to a 28% lye concentration......at least for solid bar soaps anyway. Liquid soap is another matter.....I use a 25% lye concentration for that.


IrishLass

 

[penelopejane]

Thanks PJ and DeeAnna for you explanations. I often come back to revisit this question (as you may have noticed) because every so often when i start pondering it I get confused all over again.

With soap making as DeeAnna says every ingredient, soap temp and method makes a difference in a recipe. You can't really compare what you are successfully doing with everyone else because what is successful for them might not be for you.

It makes it difficult to give people advice because everyone's solution is different because different things work.

Full water - does it speed or slow trace? A particular FO - does it rice? Stearic spots and swirls - are they ugly? Then you give people advice do - a, b, c and they come back and say I did d - why didn't it work? Just remember there is no definitive answer in soap making, just plug away doing what you are doing.