If you use palm oil at higher than 45%...

Soapmaking Forum

Help Support Soapmaking Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Apr 19, 2019
Messages
5,269
Reaction score
13,290
Location
Virginia
I’m trying to come up with a recipe for a hard, long-lasting bar of soap based on palm. I don’t want to add an animal fat for this one. To date, my recipes with palm at >40% have moved pretty fast, so I’m looking for tips on ways to slow things down. It doesn’t need to be super slow, but I would like some time to add a swirl. I usually soap at 33% lye concentration and for palm I keep my temp at around 110F, but had one batch of soaps I made in individual molds that turned out fine with a starting temp of 100 F. For that recipe I used palm (30%) & refined shea (10%) and was able to get smooth tops on the individual soaps.

Should I first try dropping the lye concentration a little? I’m hoping to avoid rivers in this one.
 
There is a thread about the Palm amounts. Some good info in there.
up your water amount , but you will have a faster moving batter unless you change out the palm a bit
 
Hmmm.. is hand whisking an option? Maybe just for the first try to make sure you don't get pudding within 2 seconds;)
I think dropping the lye concentration to 30% will already help. If that's not enough you could lower it further and cool the soap to prevent gel and rivers (unless you absolutely want to gel of course..)
I also think adding orange peel once slowed trace for me. Maybe orange EO could help? (Or another trace slowing fragrance)
My go to method for fast moving recipes is HP, but I know not everyone likes that.
 
@szaza It didn’t occur to me to use a decelerating EO or FO. Good idea! I did think of hand stirring and tried it today. I used a palm and shea based recipe I’ve made a few times before. It’s not as palm rich as I hope to go, but I thought it would make sense to try a couple of minor changes first. I’m really resistant to dropping the lye concentration because I rarely have ash problems ever since I went to 33% or greater, so I only dropped it to 32%. The big change was that I mostly hand stirred to get to stable emulsion. The batter went to a medium light trace on its own fairly quickly, but then it slowed down enough for me to scent and color 5 or 6 layers. I added the FO for each layer just before I poured. One of my FOs heated things up a bit, but that actually helped with the layering. I even managed to add an ITP two color pour for one of the layers and a cocoa pencil line! The hand stirring approach looks very promising. :)
 
Using just a whisk and also soaping at lower temps. If you can soap at just above room temp you should have more time. My lye is at about 77*F and my oils no higher than 99*F when I want a high palm concentration. I also just mix by hand with a wisk and only stick blend just a tad at the very end right before pour.
 
Using just a whisk and also soaping at lower temps. If you can soap at just above room temp you should have more time. My lye is at about 77*F and my oils no higher than 99*F when I want a high palm concentration. I also just mix by hand with a wisk and only stick blend just a tad at the very end right before pour.
I’ve been starting with my oils and split water at around 105-110F to avoid stearic spots. Do you avoid have any issues with those when you’re working at the lower temp?
 
What is your amount of Palm and hard oils?

Right now I’m at 40% palm + shea. I would like to get to 45% or higher. Based on my most recent palm soap, I think I can manage it if I hand stir. I have very little experience with fast moving recipes because I’ve stayed away from higher amounts of palm and rarely use accelerating fragrances. Except for the lard soaps, all of my soaps tend to be lowish on the longevity scale due to having a lot of soft oils. An upside of creating recipes with more stearic and palmitic is that they should be less prone to DOS, which sounds good since I don’t use EDTA.
 
That’s helpful. Thank you. It sounds like I’m on the right track with the hand stirring to emulsion. The soap I made yesterday turned out well and with no stearic spots.

@CatahoulaBubble - just to be sure I understand what you do, how do you melt your palm and to what temp do you heat it before you cool it down?

I heat it to about 110 at which point it's clear and fully melted then I let it cool to 99-100 then add my lye. But I also make goat milk soap almost exclusively so my lye is generally around 78* when I add it to my oils because my goat milk is frozen before I add the lye.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top