Soaping 101 liquid soapmaking video?

[kchaystack]

My paste was really taffy with clumps I used about 80-85% water for dilution so far using IrishLass method...

I wouldnt use more...

This is whats going on now.. Its a white cloudy layer.. Is it normal??

Really sorry for the large pics...

Your pic is not loading.

Taffy is good for paste. I would let it sit overnight and see what it looks like in the morning

 

[Dahila]

Yeah I do not do that. She also heats hers in a canning pot. I think it just speeds up the process, but if you just let it go, it will dilute fine.

I do exactly as Irishlass and every time I get the syropy, honey like beautiful soap)

 

[Susie]

My paste was really taffy with clumps I used about 80-85% water for dilution so far using IrishLass method...

I wouldnt use more...

This is whats going on now.. Its a white cloudy layer.. Is it normal??

That looks like undiluted paste to me. If it is still white in the morning, try adding about 1/4 of the white amount in water to start with, then add decreasing amounts as you go. If it is undiluted paste, the white layer should get smaller.

If it does not get smaller with the 1/4 water addition, stop adding water. That means that you have unsaponified fats. That is a whole 'nother discussion.

Let us know what happens, please?

 

[hlecter]

hi!!! Today looks like that white layer got like yellow coloured and bigger... How can that happened?

If it does not get smaller with the 1/4 water addition, stop adding water. That means that you have unsaponified fats. That is a whole 'nother discussion.

unsaponified fats means that i have to stir them more on the stage when i got the paste ?

I zapped the paste there wasnt at all... May try 2% SF next time?

 

[Susie]

Could you please post your entire recipe (including batch water and dilution water listed separately) in weights? It would help us troubleshoot much faster and more efficiently.

 

[hlecter]

Here is my recipe.

From 124 g liquids i first dissolve KOH with the same amount water (41 g KOH: 41 g H2O) and when it was fully dissolved i added the remaining 2 parts of liquid (83 g glycerin).

 

[Susie]

That should be fine on the superfat amount. Just try spraying with rubbing alcohol to burst any bubbles, then add water slowly and in small amounts with some heat to help break up that paste.

 

[hlecter]

Thank you, i ll try it and i wrote back...

I forgot to mention that when i made the paste yesterday while i was stiring with my SB after the "trace" suddenly the paste became too hard! It was impossible to stir with SB on that time, so i continued with a big spoon and again it was really difficult to stir.
Finally the paste had the translucent dark yellow-golden colour but it was as stiff and hard as cocoa butter (in solid state).

The video IrishLass posted #8 and yours from soaping101 on post #19 show the paste on the same stage looking much more soft...

I dont know if it is important but i have to mention it...

EDIT: !!!!

i followed Susies advice and i add water on small amounts 2-3% and looking how its going every time...

Finally the solution cleared!!!! I think that wasnt unsaponified oil or a strange issue, but my paste need much water... Its consistency is great, thinner than honey and sure not watery...

Here are some pics... Its next to a marketing shampoo (J&J) for clearness comparison. The second image is about an hour later, it looks like its clarity gets better time by time.

(If you can notice some little black pieces on the jar they are from the

bottom of inner pot that i had the melted oils..)​

And something important...

Summarily i used about 170% of water only for the dillution...

 

[Susie]

Looks great to me! Good job! If you will let that soap sit (sequester) for a few days to a week, those pieces should settle out and you can pour off the liquid without getting those back in.

 

[IrishLass]

I forgot to mention that when i made the paste yesterday while i was stiring with my SB after the "trace" suddenly the paste became too hard! It was impossible to stir with SB on that time, so i continued with a big spoon and again it was really difficult to stir. Finally the paste had the translucent dark yellow-golden colour but it was as stiff and hard as cocoa butter (in solid state).

The video IrishLass posted #8 and yours from soaping101 on post #19 show the paste on the same stage looking much more soft...

I've found through experience that there can be different levels of hardness/softness when it comes to paste, and that it's not always easy to judge hardness/softness from pictures. For example, in one of the pics I posted on the forum of my paste in a spoon (in the bottom of this post here ), it looks like the paste is very soft, but it actually was quite firm/sticky and took a fair bit of muscle to scoop it out of my pot! LOL

For what its worth, though, you can be absolutely confident that you have reached the paste stage successfully as soon as your batter is no longer in a liquid state/is impossible to stir, or is firm/solid enough to hold its own shape.

From your description above, once your batter had 'suddenly' become too hard, I would not even have attempted to stir it. In my opinion, that's a sure sign that you had successfully reached the paste stage at that point.

EDIT: !!!!

i followed Susies advice and i add water on small amounts 2-3% and looking how its going every time...

Finally the solution cleared!!!! I think that wasnt unsaponified oil or a strange issue, but my paste need much water... Its consistency is great, thinner than honey and sure not watery...

Yay!

For what it's worth, the more olive oil in a liquid soap formula, the more water it will need during dilution to dissolve the paste. I use only 65% OO in mine and can get away with using less water than you needed for yours, which included more OO.

Here are some pics... Its next to a marketing shampoo (J&J) for clearness comparison. The second image is about an hour later, it looks like its clarity gets better time by time.





(If you can notice some little black pieces on the jar they are from the

bottom of inner pot that i had the melted oils..)​

And something important...

Summarily i used about 170% of water only for the dillution...

Looks great!


IrishLass

 

[DeeAnna]

Well done!

 

[hlecter]

I've found through experience that there can be different levels of hardness/softness when it comes to paste, and that it's not always easy to judge hardness/softness from pictures. For example, in one of the pics I posted on the forum of my paste in a spoon (in the bottom of this post here ), it looks like the paste is very soft, but it actually was quite firm/sticky and took a fair bit of muscle to scoop it out of my pot! LOL

For what its worth, though, you can be absolutely confident that you have reached the paste stage successfully as soon as your batter is no longer in a liquid state/is impossible to stir, or is firm/solid enough to hold its own shape.

From your description above, once your batter had 'suddenly' become too hard, I would not even have attempted to stir it. In my opinion, that's a sure sign that you had successfully reached the paste stage at that point.





Yay!

For what it's worth, the more olive oil in a liquid soap formula, the more water it will need during dilution to dissolve the paste. I use only 65% OO in mine and can get away with using less water than you needed for yours, which included more OO.




Looks great!


IrishLass

Thank you so much for your kind words.

So i use 80% oo which is only 5% more than yours (75% oo recipe) and that is so significant that needs so much more water? very interesting!

In the past, before i tried to make some ls soap and i ve read on a blog that paste needs to be hard enough, with painfull stirring till the end if we want to get clear soap. Now i think thats completely wrong... But as you said, could the zap indicate that the paste is ready? Or zap is only notification for lye heavy soap? Or both?
Just a thought...

Of course i have to thank except IrishLass, and other members that participate on the topic from its beginning. Especially DeeAnna, Susie and kchaystack.

 

[Susie]

OK, having just come from another soapmaking group and having this same discussion, let me summarize here:

There is no need, whatsoever, to stir liquid soap paste past emulsification. Once you hit emulsification, you can safely put the lid on and walk away. You do not need to cook, you do not need to stir it to death. Lid it and walk away. Come back when you think about it. Minutes (mine is normally 15-30 minutes later), hours, or days. If it is paste and gelled, it is ready for a zap test. If it does not zap, it is ready to dilute. Period. No clarification test is going to tell you if the soap is safe. Only zap testing does that. If your soap fails to be clear, it is more likely due to the oils you used.

Those people on those videos make me think of the old Rice Krispie Treat commercials where the mom goes into the kitchen and acts like it was SO VERY DIFFICULT to make those treats. I just do not comprehend why people want to make this more difficult than it needs to be.

 

[IrishLass]

Thank you so much for your kind words.

So i use 80% oo which is only 5% more than yours (75% oo recipe) and that is so significant that needs more water? very interesting!

You'd be surprised how much different quantities of certain oils can affect dilution! lol

In the past, before i tried to make some ls soap and i ve read on a blog that it needs to be hard enough, with painfull stirring till the end if we want to get clear soap. Now i think thats wrong...

Where clarity is concerned, stirring technique does not matter. What matters is the type of fats used. Those alone will dictate whether one ends up with a clear soap or not. For example- if you use fats that contain lots of stearic acid such as cocoa butter or tallow, etc.. you will end up with a cloudy or opaque soap, no matter how long or short you stirred to the paste stage, or how hard or soft your paste is.

As a matter of fact, with the right kind of oils, you can end up with a perfectly clear soap even if the paste is cloudy or opaque. When I make my OO formula with part water and part glycerin as my KOH solution, my paste turns out on the softer side and it looks like opaque vanilla pudding, but it dilutes into perfectly clear liquid soap.

could the zap indicate that the paste is ready?

Yes- an absence of zap in the paste means it's ready to dilute whenever you feel like diluting.

Or zap is only notification for lye heavy soap? Or both?

Both. It could also mean that the soap needs more time to cure (especially if it is a young soap, or an un-gelled soap)


IrishLass

Edited to add: Ditto what Susie just said^^^^. I was still writing as she was posting (as often happens) lol

 

[hlecter]

I added 1% FO to the batch i made last days.

First i mix it well with equal amounts of PS80 following IrishLass method.
Soap became a little bit cloudy for some hours. I let it there cause it was bedtime and today morning it is clear again.
Also it seems that PS80 made the soap a little bit thicker and more lathery, but this is maybe only on my mind, i cant be 100% sure

Also i am making a new batch right now using olive oil pomace instead of evoo (70% oo pomace, 20% co 10% castor oil). The dilluted soap doesnt seem clear but its not cloudy either... Maybe cause of pomace colour...?

 

[Susie]

I stopped using pomace for that very reason. I can get regular OO cheaper, and my soap is not cloudy.

 

[DeeAnna]

It isn't necessarily that the PS80 makes the soap thicker -- it could very easily be the scent you added. In some trials I've been doing lately, PS80 may slightly thicken diluted LS, but it's not a big change. I've had much bigger changes due to the scent added. It's wise to test a new FO or EO by adding it to a sample of diluted soap first. Scent can cause the soap to thicken or thin or become grainy, etc.

 

[Shahtura]

With my very limited experience I thought to try to make this GLS soap. I only made CP soap twice and one time HP transparent soap prior to this experiment. To make the long story short I don't like my finished product so here is what I did:

I was trying to replicate the recipe from the beginning of the thread so I melted my oils in my crockpot:
325g OO
125g Co
50g castor oil

I used SBM calculator and figured I needed 106g KOH. I poured 106g distilled water and added 106 g KOH. When the KOH dissolved and the water cleared I added 212 g glicerin and heated it all together also stirring the solution.

I now poured my lye solution into the crockpot containing my oils and turned off the crockpot. I used my metal shaft SB ans you can not imagine how happy I was when I saw flying bubbles!

I stopped SB covered the croclpot and left it overnight. On the next morning I checked and found a paste that was sticky and felt like taffy but unlike IrishLass' , mine was not beautiful gold translucent color. Instead I had
cloudy, opaque paste in a mustard color . I also didn't see bubbles on top.

I did a zap test and there was no zap so I proceeded to dilute my paste. I weged my paste and prepared my dilution distilled water (75% of paste weight). I used a pot with simmering water and Inside I used a canning jar , as advised, with the paste +dilution water. I have to admit that I didn't use Sodium Lactate because I didn't have it on hand.

When the paste got softer , I used my SB on it. When I thought I was done I left it hoping to see a clear liquid soap in a few hours. I was very disappointed to see that it never became clear. I will attach a picture of my ugly final product. BTW, It lathers and cleans but not very well.

By now I realize I have made a few mistakes:

1. I contacted my KOH supplier and it turns out that my KOH is 90% pure. In that case I should have used Soapcalc calculator with 90% KOH ticked. Had I done so I would use 111g KOH (5 g extra) and some 15g extra of water/glicerin.

2. Had I not diluted the paste, I could have try to salvage my paste. ( as much as I hate throwing it, I will write it off as a tuition fee)

I would love to hear what should I do different next time in order to make a good clear GLS ?

Thanks in advance, Eyal

You'd be surprised how much different quantities of certain oils can affect dilution! lol



Where clarity is concerned, stirring technique does not matter. What matters is the type of fats used. Those alone will dictate whether one ends up with a clear soap or not. For example- if you use fats that contain lots of stearic acid such as cocoa butter or tallow, etc.. you will end up with a cloudy or opaque soap, no matter how long or short you stirred to the paste stage, or how hard or soft your paste is.

As a matter of fact, with the right kind of oils, you can end up with a perfectly clear soap even if the paste is cloudy or opaque. When I make my OO formula with part water and part glycerin as my KOH solution, my paste turns out on the softer side and it looks like opaque vanilla pudding, but it dilutes into perfectly clear liquid soap.

Yes- an absence of zap in the paste means it's ready to dilute whenever you feel like diluting.



Both. It could also mean that the soap needs more time to cure (especially if it is a young soap, or an un-gelled soap)


IrishLass

Edited to add: Ditto what Susie just said^^^^. I was still writing as she was posting (as often happens) lol

 

[DeeAnna]

Gosh, don't discard the diluted soap -- you CAN fix it.

I have experimented with adding small amounts of dry KOH directly to diluted soap and it works fine. Stir the KOH into the soap for a minute or two. It might not be obvious when it's fully dissolved, so I just stir "long enough" based on past experience. You'll feel the soap warm up somewhat as you stir and the soap might thicken up some -- so don't be surprised if these things happen.

Cover the container with a loose cover (not tightly capped, so no pressure will build up in the container) and set the soap in a safe out-of-the-way place to saponify. Give the soap two or three days to do its thing -- diluted soap at room temperature will saponify slower than LS paste. You can stir occasionally if you think of it, but it doesn't seem to be too important. I do stir well at the end before checking for zap and I'm very cautious when doing a zap test.

The other alternative is to first dilute the KOH in an equal or greater weight of water and stir that solution into the diluted soap. You'd follow the same drill after that point as with the dry KOH.

 

[Susie]

Gosh, don't discard the diluted soap -- you CAN fix it.

I have experimented with adding small amounts of dry KOH directly to diluted soap and it works fine. Stir the KOH into the soap for a minute or two. It might not be obvious when it's fully dissolved, so I just stir "long enough" based on past experience. You'll feel the soap warm up somewhat as you stir and the soap might thicken up some -- so don't be surprised if these things happen.

Cover the container with a loose cover (not tightly capped, so no pressure will build up in the container) and set the soap in a safe out-of-the-way place to saponify. Give the soap two or three days to do its thing -- diluted soap at room temperature will saponify slower than LS paste. You can stir occasionally if you think of it, but it doesn't seem to be too important. I do stir well at the end before checking for zap and I'm very cautious when doing a zap test.

The other alternative is to first dilute the KOH in an equal or greater weight of water and stir that solution into the diluted soap. You'd follow the same drill after that point as with the dry KOH.

^^^^This! Follow this exactly, and it will work out fine. That is one wonderful benefit of liquid soap, you can fix it.

And, by the way, awesome job on a first liquid soap! You even figured out where you went wrong by yourself!