What makes bar soap last the longest??

[Jerry S]

Who has a recipe for long lasting shower and bath soap? I have made soap from all types of ingredients but never paid attention to how long my soap lasts. Of all the ingredients I use, which combination would give me a nice bath and shower soap that would last the longest? Would they be in the hard oils or soft? I use Lard, Palm oil, Olive oil, Coconut oil, Castor and Canola oil. I have ordered some Shea butter and will add that to the list of ingredients I use.
thanks, Jerry S :wink:

 

[xyxoxy]

IMO nothing helps soap last like a nice long cure.

 

[carebear]

hard oils - especially tallow - and a low amount of water to start with. and yea, a good long cure period.

 

[ChrissyB]

Yep, harder oils, tallow is good, but if you don't like that I find palm kernel is great for making a hard long lasting soap. Ditto on the less water and long cure too. And not letting the soap sit in water, or in the spray of water while it's in the shower.

 

[Jerry S]

Nice hard bars of soap

I have never purchased “Tallow”, that is to say fat from Beef or Sheep. Would you say that plain ordinary Lard would fall into to same category? I can purchase that easily but I don’t think I can buy beef tallow.

As mentioned, I use Palm Oil in making soap. ChrissyB, you mentioned using Palm kernel oil. I looked up the difference between the two and they mention both oils have pretty much the same properties. Ref http://www.colebrothers.com/soap/oils.html What do you think?
I’m differently going with the less water as you all mentioned though on my next batch.
Thanks, Jerry S :wink:

 

[xyxoxy]

Re: Nice hard bars of soap

I looked up the difference between the two and they mention both oils have pretty much the same properties. Ref http://www.colebrothers.com/soap/oils.html What do you think?

I think that page is wrong. I have not seen that site before but I wouldn't count it as reliable info. Aside from the word "Palm" those two oils do not have a lot in common. Both are hard oils but PKO is much harder than regular Palm. If you compare them in Soapcalc you will see PKO is much closer to Coconut oil than Palm.

But considering the gist of your question... Palm is pretty close to lard and tallow.

All that said... you should never simply substitute one oil for another without running it through a soap calc. The amount of lye needed will almost always be different even if only slightly. Plus it's just a good practice.

Good luck!

 

[Jerry S]

long lasting bars...

Hmmm…. thanks Mickey, I think you have a point about the different readings you would get with the two different oils running it through the soap calc. I never thought of doing that to compare on against the other to see which one requires more lye..

I always do use the soap calc though before mixing any of my soap batches….which would give me a accurate mixture of lye to my oils. Sooo...I think I'll try a batch using lard, Coconut oil, Palm Oil, less water and go with a long cure...

Jerry S…

 

[xyxoxy]

No problem... I'm sure with a little trial and error you will get something wonderful.

Here is a little trick to compare 2 different oils in soapcalc.
Create a recipe using 100% of the main oil you want to compare.. ex: Palm. Then click the other oils you want to compare it to one by one and look at the properties.

Hopefully this picture will do a better job of explaining.
As you see I've selected PALM on the right and am comparing it to PKO on the left. You can then click any others as you like to see how they compare to Palm.

Let us know how it works out.

 

[Jerry S]

Making bars last longer

Thanks for that tip Mickey, yeah I never had occasion to test one against the other (oils) for hardness and other properties until I thought I’d like to make some bars that would last a little longer than the ones I’ve made. Your tip as shown on soap calc will reveal hardness properties of different oils etc. I’ll have to experiment a little.
Thanks,
Jerry S

 

[Jerry S]

Long lasting bars

I don’t mean to beat this topic to death but for your sake Mickey I have to mention my exploration of soap calc.
I used the soap calc to run some different oils through for Hardness properties, Bubblyness, Cleansing, Conditioning and Creamy.

Palm Kernel oil/flakes, Coconut oil topped the list for hardness, bubbly and cleansing. (Homage to you for the PKO tip). Coco butter has high points for hardness but also has high points for conditioning and creamy qualities, which are desirable. Palm Oil is not as hard, only coming in at a 50 but scores well on the conditioning and creaminess. Shea butter falls into this category as well. Soooo, thanks again. I have a little more to work with here in planning my next batch of “Harder more long lasting bars”, but I’ll have to bite the bullet and buy PKO, Shea Butter, Coco Butter online.
Jerry S :wink:

 

[Ceri]

I made a really nice hard bar once with cocoa butter (organic, Ghanaian) and coconut oil, it lasted for aaaaaages

 

[donniej]

FULLY hydrogenated oils will make a very hard, long lasting bar. Not Crisco or the other shortenings at the grocery store, they're only PARTIALLY hydrogenated. Fully hydrogenated oils will have all there fatty acids converted to stearic.

I've made soap with with fully hydrogenated soybean oil and coconut and it was like a brick. It didn't get soft in water and was very long lasting. It was very inexpensive to make but was just like Ivory.

I've made soap the old fashioned way, by boiling it in water with salt & lye. This removes the glycerin and the soap floats on top of the salt water. The glycerin absorbs water and makes the soap soft... by removing it, the soap stays harder in water. The downside is of course that the soap isn't as nice on skin. You can experiment with this by grating some soap and simply mixing it in a pot of hot (near boiling) salt water. Scoop out the soap curds and rinse the salt out with luke-warm water. Then press into a mold and let dry. The resulting soap is very light in color and very hard.