celticjanis
Active Member
Can somebody tell me if these are, and how to prevent stearic acid spots on my goat milk soap?
Stearic acid spots?
- Thread starter celticjanis
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Please post your recipe as well as your lye/water and processs. By weight is best. Then we can help assist in troubleshooting
It's hard to tell, but they look to me like they could be stearic spots.
The best preventative for stearic spots that I have found is to soap warmer (somewhere between 110/43CF and 120F/49C).
Basically, the trick is to soap warm enough in order to keep the stearic and palmitic fatty acids (which have higher melting points) from precipitating out of melted suspension before the heat from lye solution can kick in and saponify them properly.
Your mileage may vary depending on your formula and/or other factors, but for what its worth, the 'sweet spot' soaping temp to keep stearic spots at bay with my high stearic/palmitic formulas is about 112F/44C.
IrishLass
The best preventative for stearic spots that I have found is to soap warmer (somewhere between 110/43CF and 120F/49C).
Basically, the trick is to soap warm enough in order to keep the stearic and palmitic fatty acids (which have higher melting points) from precipitating out of melted suspension before the heat from lye solution can kick in and saponify them properly.
Your mileage may vary depending on your formula and/or other factors, but for what its worth, the 'sweet spot' soaping temp to keep stearic spots at bay with my high stearic/palmitic formulas is about 112F/44C.
IrishLass
If you add lye to goat milk rather than add lye to water, then some of the light spots might be bits of saponified milk fat that will form while you are mixing the lye with the milk. But it could be stearic spots per Irish Lass. I'm just guessing without much info on how you made the soap and what the recipe is.
