What happens if I use more lye than my recipe States ??

[angel01]

I made a salt soap
600grams CO
350 grams OO
50 grams Shea butter
I realised after I made it I forgot to add the olive in with the other oils
I used 700 grams of pink salt.
Can this still be ok to use once cured ???
Any feedback would be great. Thankyou

 

[FlybyStardancer]

How much lye did you use? Though if you're missing that much oil, you're bound to be really lye-heavy. Soaps that lye heavy are dangerous to use.

 

[gemsupthepoley]

Add the olive oil and Hot Process it?

Run it through SoapCalc without the OO that'll tell you what % of lye that is over.

 

[The Efficacious Gentleman]

It also depends on how much water was used. People have made a Castile that was 40% lye heavy (ie 40% lye excess) and it cured out with time - but it called for a lot of water.

 

[Dorymae]

Either do a HP "rebatch" or be prepared to wait a long long time to cure it out. Even then, before using a bar I would cut one in half and do a zap test to the inner most part.

 

[DeeAnna]

Without the olive oil in this recipe, the lye excess is roughly -40%. I'm really doubtful a soap made with a "normal" amount of water and this much excess lye will ever cure out to be skin safe. Honestly, I'd rebatch this soap and add the missing fat.

If we were talking about, say, a -5% lye excess, I'd be comfortable suggesting this soap should just get a long cure. But -40% .... wowser, that's a lot of extra lye.

 

[Seawolfe]

Put some gloves on, grate it up, add the missing olive oil. You can try to do this all in a crockpot to see if you can jumpstart the saponification process again. Or if it doesn't set up after adding the extra oil put it in tubs and use it as a scrub (after a decent cure I guess).

Was your pink salt fine? Or coarse?

 

[angel01]

Thanks everyone. It was fine pink salt and yes I ran it through the calculator without the OO and I had more water and 50grams more lye