Soap won't lather

[Moebym]

Hello, all,

I created my third batch of soap a few days ago, intending to give a few bars to my mom as a birthday present in about a month's time.

Oil weight: 660g, or about 1.5 lb

• Avocado 10%
• Coconut 76 deg 20%
• Olive 20%
• Palm 25%
• Shea butter 15%
• Castor 10%

Lye conc.: 31.159%
Additives:

• ~1 tsp rose kaolin clay and 1.5 tsp of TD, both suspended into about equal quantities of glycerin and mixed with a milk frother
• ~1 tsp of fragrance oil (White Tea and Ginger from Brambleberry (?))
• ~1 tsp of sodium lactate

I used the heat transfer method to melt the oils. The batter got a little too thick before I added the TD, which I later realized was not mixed into enough glycerin (I was trying to save up my glycerin since I only had a 1 lb bottle) because the final result has highly visible white clumps and streaks in it. I also nearly forgot to add the FO, only mixing it in right before pouring the batter into the mold.

This isn't even my main concern because when I took a few crumbs of soap that had fallen off and attempted to work up a lather, there was almost no lather. With my previous two batches, even the small pieces that'd broken off created a noticeable lather.

Will the soap lather more with time, or did I just screw up with the TD and have to remake the soap? Thank you!

 

[shunt2011]

Your recipe should be okay. Just give it a good cure.

 

[lsg]

It is my experience that the longer a soap ages, the better it lathers.

 

[DeeAnna]

I'm with the others -- a soap that's only a few days old will create some lather, but not nearly as well as it will after some weeks of curing. Test a sample every week or so -- it's a neat thing to experience how the lather changes.

 

[cmzaha]

Since I use low CO in my soaps when they are still babies they will, many times, not lather until they are a couple of weeks old.

 

[soapmaker]

Recipe looks like it should lather nicely. I know what you mean, mine lathers the next day when I clean up, but the TD shouldn't prevent that. Unless you made a mistake in measuring it should lather after a cure.

 

[BrewerGeorge]

Needs more curing time.