Quick background… ran recipe thru soap maker 3. Using 50/50 lye and water and rest of liquid is goats milk. Traditional oils (olive, coconut, palm and castor). Looks like lye pockets… I want to shred and cook in the crock pot… thots? I am sure it’s not lye heavy but something went wrong when I soaped… just not sure what. Can this be saved?
Rebatch or not
- Thread starter Crazy Goat
- Start date
Help Support Soapmaking Forum:
Stearic spots maybe?
NaOH dissolves so easily in water that you'd have to do something really foolish for the large spot to be actual NaOH. Not saying this never happens, but I'd say it's more likely there's some other problem that's at fault here.
Did you add the milk directly into the water-NaOH solution? If so, the larger spots might be milkfat that saponified into soap before you put the milk and lye solution into your other fats.
The little flecks might be also be bits of milkfat soap or they might be stearic spots. If stearic spots, try melting your palm until it is visually clear and then waiting, oh, maybe 10-15 minutes to let any invisible chunks completely melt. That tends to help, although no guarantees.
Did you add the milk directly into the water-NaOH solution? If so, the larger spots might be milkfat that saponified into soap before you put the milk and lye solution into your other fats.
The little flecks might be also be bits of milkfat soap or they might be stearic spots. If stearic spots, try melting your palm until it is visually clear and then waiting, oh, maybe 10-15 minutes to let any invisible chunks completely melt. That tends to help, although no guarantees.
That’s what I thought, too! I strain it directly from the lye/water tank, so I know it was clear… I do add the frozen goats milk all at once in to the lye water. I had it at a medium trace when I poured. I “licked” the spots and got zapped, but I just made it yesterday, so… ???
Some are… but it is those bigger ones that have me nervous. I did a zap test on the spots and they are hot… but could this be because I just made it yesterday?
I'd give it a few days and see if they are still zappy. If so, and if those are lye chunks, then rebatching is probably not going to help you.
Speaking from experience, you simply cannot ensure during rebatch that each chunk is fully dissolved in water (because NaOH will not dissolve in oil). You also can't get the rebatched soap liquid enough to strain out each and every chunk, some of which could be quite small. You also have no way to check the interior of each soap bar to make sure there isn't another chunk lurking inside, where you cannot see it or test for it until the bar has been used enough for it to be exposed.
Speaking from experience, you simply cannot ensure during rebatch that each chunk is fully dissolved in water (because NaOH will not dissolve in oil). You also can't get the rebatched soap liquid enough to strain out each and every chunk, some of which could be quite small. You also have no way to check the interior of each soap bar to make sure there isn't another chunk lurking inside, where you cannot see it or test for it until the bar has been used enough for it to be exposed.
I was afraid of that… I’ll keep you posted. Thanks for the info!
But, what really makes me frustrated is why? I strained, used soap calc and still…. Makes me want to cry…
I'm so sorry... when this happened to me, it was a large batch, as well. And I HATE throwing stuff away!
I'm going to guess that some of your frozen goat milk might have frozen parts of the lye solution, causing the NaOH to precipitate out of solution - so then it would not mix with the oils. Did you leave it to sit for a bit before mixing it into the oils? For future, maybe mix the GM into the oils first, and then add the MB lye solution to that.
My only other thought would be a naughty FO that caused some separation, leaving you with some parts of the batter that didn't get fully mixed. But the frozen milk seems like the most likely culprit to me.
I'm going to guess that some of your frozen goat milk might have frozen parts of the lye solution, causing the NaOH to precipitate out of solution - so then it would not mix with the oils. Did you leave it to sit for a bit before mixing it into the oils? For future, maybe mix the GM into the oils first, and then add the MB lye solution to that.
My only other thought would be a naughty FO that caused some separation, leaving you with some parts of the batter that didn't get fully mixed. But the frozen milk seems like the most likely culprit to me.
I never had these issues with my 5 lb loaves and using 100% gm. It’s all been with these 16 lb loaves. In regards, to adding gm directly to the oils, what temp do you soap at? Do you think large batches of gm is just too much too go wrong? How big of a gm loaf have you had success with?
I soap at room temp with MB lye, except the few times I’ve used frozen GM. In those cases, I didn’t use MB lye at all; I mixed NaOH directly into the frozen GM to make a fresh lye solution.
Sorry that’s not any help to you. Maybe for these large batches, you could try cold GM, not frozen, mixed into the oils first, before adding your MB lye solution.
Sorry that’s not any help to you. Maybe for these large batches, you could try cold GM, not frozen, mixed into the oils first, before adding your MB lye solution.
Yes, I want to try that…. I’m at a crossroads and am thinking about trying to get rid of my larger tanks…. I think the gm soaps need to be made in smaller loaves. The only way I can justify the tanks is if I can come up with a good base recipe… the search goes on! Thank you for all your help!
