Leaky Oil in Soap

[Kimberly G Lewis]

Hello,

I made a rice potato carrot soap. My Lye was at the bottom of my measuring cup.( I might have forgot to stir it up). So I threw out the solid part that was at the bottom of the measuring cup and I used the liquid part. I put it in the mold and days later it was a crack in the middle with a river of oil going through it. So I rebatched it and put it back in the mold and now the top of the soap is shiny and the sides are very oily and have not solidified. Can you please tell me if I can put it back in the crockpot and re batch it? Should I add more lye to it or throw it away?

 

[Rsapienza]

Hello,

I made a rice potato carrot soap. My Lye was at the bottom of my measuring cup.( I might have forgot to stir it up). So I threw out the solid part that was at the bottom of the measuring cup and I used the liquid part. I put it in the mold and days later it was a crack in the middle with a river of oil going through it. So I rebatched it and put it back in the mold and now the top of the soap is shiny and the sides are very oily and have not solidified. Can you please tell me if I can put it back in the crockpot and re batch it? Should I add more lye to it or throw it away?

I think I would throw it away. I don't think you should have continued to make the soap knowing that it didn't have the correct amount of lye in it. And to fix something doing a rebatch, I believe you would have to know exactly what it is you were missing for it to come out right. I could be wrong, but this is my understanding.

 

[TheGecko]

Throw it away. And then put all your soaping things away and go back to basics with Soap Queen and/or Soaping 101 and pay particular attention as to why we carefully measure everything and why we use a Soap Calculator.

I’m not trying to be mean here because fortunately your soap isn’t dangerous (just grossly “super fatted”), but I’m concerned because what if you had added too much lye and decided to carry on? And your soap doesn’t have to be lye heavy to be dangerous...Essential and Fragrance Oils is another area you have to measure carefully. Please be mindful of what you are doing.

 

[shunt2011]

I agree with the others. There's a reason you measure and do thing appropriately to make soap. You threw away solid lye therefore didn't have what was needed to make soap. Rule one is make sure your lye is dissolved properly. Why you thought it was a good idea to just toss the solids and use the liquid. It would have been less costly to just make a new batch of lye. Rebatching won't help as you don't know how much lye you're missing.

 

[GemstonePony]

Without knowing how much lye you threw away, there is no way to fix the soap. If you attempt to rebatch and over estimate the amount necessary, you will have dangerous soap, and if you underestimate you will most likely get a moldy, oily mixture that doesn't clean well. Since I gather that you made this days ago, rot might easily have already set in from the food you added, and attempting to salvage any of the current soap for future batches could easily cause those batches to go rancid.
I strongly recommend discarding this attempt and cleaning/disinfecting any surfaces it has been touching before attempting another batch, since it appears you have accidentally made NaOH-thickened oily soup that has been set out for a few days.
I also recommended reviewing basic soap-making procedures, as failing to ensure the lye solution was properly mixed can result in undissolved chunks of NaOH making it into your soap, which would cause chemical burns as the bar was used.
Soap is fun, but you absolutely must mix thoroughly and measure accurately or the results will be ineffective and unpleasant at best and dangerous at worst.

 

[Kimberly G Lewis]

Throw it away. And then put all your soaping things away and go back to basics with Soap Queen and/or Soaping 101 and pay particular attention as to why we carefully measure everything and why we use a Soap Calculator.

I’m not trying to be mean here because fortunately your soap isn’t dangerous (just grossly “super fatted”), but I’m concerned because what if you had added too much lye and decided to carry on? And your soap doesn’t have to be lye heavy to be dangerous...Essential and Fragrance Oils is another area you have to measure carefully. Please be mindful of what you are doing.

I have been making soap for over a year using the same recipe that has been successful and this was the first time that this ever happened. That is why I asked this question.

 

[TheGecko]

I have been making soap for over a year using the same recipe that has been successful and this was the first time that this ever happened. That is why I asked this question.

Then, no offense, you should have known better

 

[GemstonePony]

I have been making soap for over a year using the same recipe that has been successful and this was the first time that this ever happened. That is why I asked this question.

If I pull out the ingredients for a cake but end up discarding most of my flour, but mixed what's left and popped it into the oven anyways, would you be surprised if the end result was not cake? Similarly, you've discarded most of your lye, so what you have is not soap. It doesn't matter what ingredients you measured initially if they didn't get mixed properly and incorporated into the final product.
It's nice that you've used a recipe before, but if you're leaving out the prescribed amount of an ingredient then you are by definition no longer following the recipe. I'm all for experimenting and tweaking, but you should know exactly what is in your soap mixture at all times. Furthermore, you should have a grasp of the chemistry behind what you're trying to accomplish, and the math behind what it will take to get you there before tweaking anything. For the health and safety of everyone around you, please do some homework before attempting another batch of soap, just in case you leave the recipe again. Oily mixture is irritating, but there are plenty of extremely dangerous mistakes you can make.

 

[DeeAnna]

Then, no offense, you should have known better

A comment that has to start with an apology should most likely not be aired.

Statements like this are not going to help the OP keep an open mind and remain willing to learn. SMF isn't "The Dish", which had a culture that was more about "setting people in their place" than helping people learn better ways of making soap.

I would like to see this conversation get back to more constructive comments.

 

[cmzaha]

I am sorry anyone making soap for a year should know to make a new solution of lye if there is a hard layer of anything on the bottom. I was in no forums or had no teachers for my first couple of yrs making soap and I knew better.

I remember one of my first mistakes of a crystallized layer on the bottom of my lye solution was adding sugar to my lye solution, I remember I dumped it because I did not really know if it was lye, sugar, or both that crystallized.

 

[GemstonePony]

I am sorry anyone making soap for a year should know to make a new solution of lye if there is a hard layer of anything on the bottom. I was in no forums or had no teachers for my first couple of yrs making soap and I knew better.

I remember one of my first mistakes of a crystallized layer on the bottom of my lye solution was adding sugar to my lye solution, I remember I dumped it because I did not really know if it was lye, sugar, or both that crystallized.

I had a lye solution do that to me, and I wound up slowly sprinkling sugar into the lye solution a granule or 2 at a time just to get the crust soft enough for me to break up so I could dump it and start over. Lye can volcano with a vengeance if it's given too much sugar too quickly (don't we all?), hence my caution with the sugar.

 

[Kimberly G Lewis]

Thank you for your respectful comments.

 

[DeeAnna]

There are ways to fix a soap like this, but the chances are pretty high that the fix could make the problem even worse. Even I would not try to fix this batch, and I'm one of those nerdy chemist types.

I agree with the others to discard the soap and take a fresh start.

 

[Kimberly G Lewis]

There are ways to fix a soap like this, but the chances are pretty high that the fix could make the problem even worse. Even I would not try to fix this batch, and I'm one of those nerdy chemist types.

I agree with the others to discard the soap and take a fresh start.

Thank you for your kind response.

 

[Arimara]

To be fair, I've had the same problem with hard lye at the bottom. It was KOH and it was one of my first LS pastes. I just mixed the lye again because I knew it wasn't mixed in when I added it. It took a minute or two, but it dissolved.

 

[TheGecko]

A comment that has to start with an apology should most likely not be aired.

Why not? I am not trying to be offensive so it is appropriate to state it.

Statements like this are not going to help the OP keep an open mind and remain willing to learn. SMF isn't "The Dish", which had a culture that was more about "setting people in their place" than helping people learn better ways of making soap.

I don't know what "The Dish" is, but from your snarky tone I'm guessing it's some trash show.

I took a soft approach, but by the poster's response that she was an experienced soap blah blah blah, a little 'tough love' was in order. ANYONE claiming to have been making soap for a year SHOULD know better...it's as simple as that.

 

[atiz]

ANYONE claiming to have been making soap for a year SHOULD know better...it's as simple as that.

That may be true, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's helpful/constructive to point it out.

I was never on the Dish, but as far as I know it was an older soaping forum that tended to be pretty inimical to newcomers / unexperienced people. Again, not my personal experience since I have none.

 

[TheGecko]

Ya know...done. If you'll want to award blue ribbons, pass out bon-bons and sing kumbyeya...go for it.

 

[KimW]

I agree - It really stinks, but I think you need to just throw it out. Then have some ice cream... Edited to add: Sounds like you know the not thoroughly mixed lye solution was the culprit, so you got that going for you!

I too had something similar happen early on in my soap making experience, but far enough on that I was "comfortable", for lack of a better word, with the process and what I knew about the chemistry. I'm also a bread baker and know from both of these that becoming too comfortable with a recipe can end up being somewhat disastrous. This, just to say I know how easy it can be for "comfort" to turn into a lack of diligence. I recently had to go back and re-read a bread recipe I developed (my own recipe, girl!!) and have been using for literally 3 years and found I had indeed made a mistake in not just one, but TWO bread batches (I'm a little slow on the uptake sometimes - lol). My own recipe - can you imagine? Thankfully, soap is like bread in that you know pretty quick that something's gone wrong. Sadly, while I can feed a not so tasty bread to the fish in our pond, I sometimes can't make use of a failed soap (ugh!). BUT, I - and you - can go back to a recipe with care and do another batch with fresh eyes and get back on track.

Yes, a failed batch really stinks, but don't let throwing it out get you down. I'm guessing that if you've been soaping for at least a year, you're at least well familiar with the safety, procedures, and science of soap making. So, maybe just do a careful study of your recipe, as I just did with my bread, then make another batch (perhaps a smaller one if possible) with your mindset as though you've never made that soap recipe. I'm betting you'll learn something, just like I did, and find out exactly what went wrong and why, and you'll be sailing along again in not time.

 

[Kimberly G Lewis]

I agree - It really stinks, but I think you need to just throw it out. Then have some ice cream... Edited to add: Sounds like you know the not thoroughly mixed lye solution was the culprit, so you got that going for you!

I too had something similar happen early on in my soap making experience, but far enough on that I was "comfortable", for lack of a better word, with the process and what I knew about the chemistry. I'm also a bread baker and know from both of these that becoming too comfortable with a recipe can end up being somewhat disastrous. This, just to say I know how easy it can be for "comfort" to turn into a lack of diligence. I recently had to go back and re-read a bread recipe I developed (my own recipe, girl!!) and have been using for literally 3 years and found I had indeed made a mistake in not just one, but TWO bread batches (I'm a little slow on the uptake sometimes - lol). My own recipe - can you imagine? Thankfully, soap is like bread in that you know pretty quick that something's gone wrong. Sadly, while I can feed a not so tasty bread to the fish in our pond, I sometimes can't make use of a failed soap (ugh!). BUT, I - and you - can go back to a recipe with care and do another batch with fresh eyes and get back on track.

Yes, a failed batch really stinks, but don't let throwing it out get you down. I'm guessing that if you've been soaping for at least a year, you're at least well familiar with the safety, procedures, and science of soap making. So, maybe just do a careful study of your recipe, as I just did with my bread, then make another batch (perhaps a smaller one if possible) with your mindset as though you've never made that soap recipe. I'm betting you'll learn something, just like I did, and find out exactly what went wrong and why, and you'll be sailing along again in not time.

Thank you