Recipe help re keeping oils out for S/F (HP)

[gemsupthepoley]

Hi folks. Back after a long absense due to life in general, too many other hobbies.......

So, I'm back making shave soap. Copied a reciepe as follows. I ran it through soap calc and got the exact figures. However, if I'm keeping back half the lanolin and shea for super fat after the cook, should I not be halfing those values in soap calc. This will surely reduce the KOH needed. Not sure if the Hp method cooks out the extra KOH. Many thanks in advance.


204.1 grams Stearic Acid
113.4 grams Coconut Oil
90.7 grams Beef Tallow
49.9 grams Glycerin
22.7 grams Lanolin
22.7 grams Shea Butter
17.0 grams Fragrance Oil
201.8 grams Distilled Water
99.4 grams KOH

 

[DeeAnna]

If you keep half of the lanolin and shea out of the recipe, then are you setting your superfat to zero? If you're still keeping the superfat to some positive number then your soap will have more superfat than just the lanolin and shea portion.

 

[gemsupthepoley]

So, take off the reserved oils from the calculation and set the superfat in soap calc to zero. All the lye and oils are reacted and the remaining oils then added are superfat. Add them at 5% of the weight of oils used. Did I get that right....please.....

Is it not a wee bitty dangerous to set the superfat at zero?

 

[DeeAnna]

"...So, take off the reserved oils from the calculation and set the superfat in soap calc to zero. All the lye and oils are reacted and the remaining oils then added are superfat. Add them at 5% of the weight of oils used. Did I get that right....please....."

It's one valid way to do it. It's not the only way, nor is it the way I do it, but it's one way soapers handle superfat calculations. It will be fine.

"...Is it not a wee bitty dangerous to set the superfat at zero? ..."

No, it's safe. Honestly. I agree it SOUNDS scary, but it's really not.

First thing -- If you use soapcalc or most any other online calc, the recipe is based on your NaOH being 100% pure. It's probably closer to 95-97% pure as it comes fresh from your distributor. The purity drops gradually as you open the bottle and expose the NaOH to new water vapor and carbon dioxide. So right there, there is a "hidden" superfat in your recipe of the difference between 100% and the real purity of your NaOH. So setting the superfat to zero in soapcalc means your soap has more like 3-5% superfat. I routinely make soap with a "real" superfat around 3% and it's fine.

Second thing -- Even if you did make a slightly lye heavy soap, a modest amount of excess lye will gradually dissipate during the cure period. Kevin Dunn did experiments with soap made with an intentional negative superfat (a lye excess, in other words) and the soap tested fine after a cure period. A slight lye excess is not nearly the scary monster it might seem to be. It is true you would not want to bathe with such a soap while the soap is still zappy, but give the soap a reasonable time to cure and it will be fine.

 

[gemsupthepoley]

Thanks DeeAnna, I can work things out from there. I checked soapcal with my above proposal and it only added less than a gramme of lye extra!!

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

If you want, you can keep just 4% out and set the SF to 1% for being far too cautious, but as DeeAnna said it is not really needed.

I put it all in to the calc, calculate it and then I see the weights of the oils that I need for the SF. I make a note, switch the calc mode from % to weight and remove the SF oils and the SF % from the calc and recalculate. That gives me the 0% SF recipe with all that it needs, plus the grams of the SF needed

 

[gemsupthepoley]

EFG. Thanks, I think I did that playing with soapcalc. (but not for this recipe or the first batch- which is fantastic)

 

[dixiedragon]

I'm confused why you wouldn't add the superfat oil into your calculations? It seems unnecessarily complicated to do that.

 

[Susie]

And I would stop using SoapCalc for those calculations and start using something that adjusts on the fly without swapping windows.

 

[gemsupthepoley]

And I would stop using SoapCalc for those calculations and start using something that adjusts on the fly without swapping windows.

Like? Any recommendations?

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

Susie makes no secret of her fondness for soapee. It is very good, I have to say.

 

[DeeAnna]

Try soapee.com

 

[Susie]

Indeed, Soapee.com is much more user friendly to me! SoapCalc was so very intimidating to me as a newbie soaper that I hated suggesting it to anyone. Then having to make a change, hit calculate, hit view/print result to see each and every tweak is very frustrating when I am trying to figure out a new recipe, or helping someone troubleshoot their problem soap.

 

[earlene]

I use them both. In fact at times I use others as well. It depends on what I want to make.

I find Soapee is great if I want to do a Dual Lye soap.

MMS (at the Sage) is useful if I want to determine the amount of SL (Sodium Lactate) to use, just to verify my calculations are correct. It's not my favorite, but it's useful in this regard, for me.

Summer Bee Meadow is useful for liquid soap. Unless anyone has a better lye calculator of LS, it's the only one I have found that seems to include most everything I think is needed. But I've only made LS twice, so I am not that experienced at the process. It looks like Soapee works for LS as well, but I had not heard of it yet when I made my first LS.

But I've been using SoapCalc the longest and seem most comfortable with it for my simplest recipes. Plus when I save it to my computer it is only one page, whereas Soapee tends to be a two page document if I put in the same amount of notes as in SoapCalc. And opening the SoapCalc file is faster than opening the Soapee file because they are saved to my computer in different formats. Plus if I choose to share the recipe via the saved file it is easier with the SoapCalc file than with the Soapee file due the saved format. I am sure there is probably a way to remedy that, but I haven't found it necessary to figure it out, so I wouldn't let that deter me if I was determined.

 

[gemsupthepoley]

Indeed, Soapee.com is much more user friendly to me! SoapCalc was so very intimidating to me as a newbie soaper that I hated suggesting it to anyone. Then having to make a change, hit calculate, hit view/print result to see each and every tweak is very frustrating when I am trying to figure out a new recipe, or helping someone troubleshoot their problem soap.

I'm nowhere asexperienced as you folks but thats what hit me right away.

Thanks very much.