Room Temp Cold Process - have you tried?

[TheGecko]

Unlike many others, I have been only focusing on the room temperature method for making soap. I feel that it is faster in the sense I don't need to track temperatures and wait for oils to cool. I make my lye water and let it sit until the next day. Once it is fully cooled, I weigh out and mix my room temp oils. I add all my fragrances and additives then SB to trace. I pour the room temp soap into the mold and allow it to gel. (Is gel required if I work with this room temp method??)

Some folks want their soaps to gel and some do not; it's a personal preference. You can mix your soap at higher temps and then stick it in the frig or freezer or you can mix at lower temps and then insuluate and/or use a heating pad and/or put in a preheated oven.

At what temperature you soap at is also a matter of personal preference. Some folks use the heat transfer method, some soap at 110 degrees, some soap at 90 degrees, some at 'room temperature' which can vary from 65 to 80 degrees. What temp I soap at is really dependent on what I am making...if it is a no color or single color soap, I will do so at higher temps. If it's goat milk, it's around 70 degrees.

 

[MadTeddyBear]

You can also use a concentrated lye solution to even out the temperature with room temperature soaping. Mixing it at 1:1 leaves some of the lye undissolved. If you let that cool and add the remaining water the lye solution will heat back up, but not nearly as high as doing it all at once. This helps melt hard oils without needing to track your temperatures (as much).

 

[jcandleattic]

Mixing it at 1:1 leaves some of the lye undissolved.

I've never had undissolved lye left in a 50/50 solution. You just need to make sure you keep stirring as you are adding your lye to your liquid for it to all dissolve.

 

[shunt2011]

I’ve never had undissolved lye in my 50/50 master batch ever. So not sure where this information is coming from.

 

[Mobjack Bay]

@penelopejane and @DeeAnna Now, this is interesting... I made a new recipe today, with 45% palm and using a 37% lye concentration. Given the amount of palm, I added my RT lye when the melted fats and oils were at 115F. That’s 25-30 degrees warmer compared with when I make the lard recipe. I split the batter into three portions, scented them differently and colored one split with mica. I then put the mold into a pre-heated 140F oven as I described above. AND then a miracle occurred (yes, this is a miracle with respect to my experiences using individual cavity molds). It may be an example of the “special case” category described by Clara Lindbergh, where the heat of saponification is enough to take an individual bar to the critical gelling temperature of 160F or above. The key thing here relative to my usual methods is that I started out with batter that was 25-30F warmer.

I didn’t think to check on the soap until at least 30 minutes after I stuck the mold in the oven. The two soaps on the right were gelling by then and had surface temps of 149F. The middle two soaps had surface temps of 124F and the two on the left were at 115F. Next time I see this happening I will stick my probe thermometer into the soap to measure the internal temp.



Here’s what they looked like an hour later.



It look like the soaps on the far left also gelled! Dang@$#! I did not think to check the temperature...

And then another hour later:


The soaps in the middle were the only ones with mica. I guess they may have gone through gel too, but if so, it wasn’t obvious. I put the plastic over the top because the soaps on the right developed a little ash.

I guess I will be closely watching all of the soaps I make in individual molds now that I’ve seen this happen with the Palm recipe.

 

[penelopejane]

@penelopejane and @DeeAnna Now, this is interesting... I made a new recipe today, with 45% palm and using a 37% lye concentration. Given the amount of palm, I added my RT lye when the melted fats and oils were at 115F. That’s 25-30 degrees warmer compared with when I make the lard recipe. I split the batter into three portions, scented them differently and colored one split with mica. I then put the mold into a pre-heated 140F oven as I described above. AND then a miracle occurred (yes, this is a miracle with respect to my experiences using individual cavity molds). It may be an example of the “special case” category described by Clara Lindbergh, where the heat of saponification is enough to take an individual bar to the critical gelling temperature of 160F.
I guess I will be closely watching all of the soaps I make in individual molds now that I’ve seen this happen with the Palm recipe.

Darn it! Now I’ll have to take the temps of my soaps after I put them to bed. I’m a little worried because I am pretty sure my “system” is right on the edge of being warm enough and opening it up might release some necessary heat too early. But, heck, anything for science!

 

[TheGecko]

Soap is science for sure, and not a very exact science because there are myriad of variables that can affect the outcome of your soap: the size of your batch, the kind of mold you use, your lye solution, the combination of oils and/or butter, additives including scent and color, the temperature of your lye solution, the temperature of your oils and/or butters, the density of your batter (emulsion up to thick trace), freezing, refrigerating, using the oven, using a heating pad, insulting, leaving it free, the overall ambient temperature, and so on and so forth.

When I started soap making in mid-Spring I was soaping at about 110F, medium trace, silicone mold, ambient temp of 75F. Covered soap with plastic wrap, moved to the garage of same temp, covered with towels. Gelled soap was unmolded and cut in 24 hours.

When the heat of Summer arrived, I was soaping at around 90F, thin trace, silicone mold, ambient temp of 80F. Covered soap with plastic wrap, moved to garage of same temp, covered with towels. Gelled soap was unmolded and cut in 16 to 18 hours.

As the outside temp increased to the 90sF and beyond and I got into making goat milk so, I decreased my lye temperature to around 70F and my oils/butters to about 75F (clear, no cloudiness), emulsion, silicone mold, ambient temp of 80F. Covered with a piece of cardboard or spritz with alcohol, moved to the garage of 90+F. Gelled soap was unmolded and cut in about 12 hours. After the first GMS failure, subsequent batches were put in the frig, no gel, unmolded in 24 hours, brought to room temp and then cut.

Fall has arrived. Out of habit, I'm still soaping a cooler temps and emulsion with an ambient temp of 70F. Soap is covered and placed in garage of same temp. But the overnight temperatures are falling down to 50sF. No gelling. Cannot unmold for 48 hours minimum. It's another 24 hours before I can cut.

Last Sunday I made a 2lb batch of single color soap; half went into a 1lb silicone mold, the other half went into 2-15 cavity mini molds (silicone). The 1lb stayed inside, the cavity molds were put in the garage. Unmolded both yesterday afternoon, no gelling. The 1lb batch came out a mottled color, medium at one end to almost white at the other. The mini soaps were a dark color. It's been 12 hours and everything is covered with a fine layer of soda ash, but the color as evened out. I should be able to cut the 1lb batch to night.

Soaps I made the week before are finally starting to dry out, they no longer feel soft.

No soap making this weekend, I'll be out of town on a knitting retreat.