Teach Soap

A few months ago, I purchased a 8lb bucket of Palm oil from Soaper's Choice. I never order anything from this company before and I from doing research the oil needs to be melted from the bucket. My question is once the oil is melted and transferred into smaller containers do I need to remelt the entire container or just scoop the amount I need. Would the steric acid be separated?


Thank you for any help on this.

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http://blissfulsoaps.wordpress.com/

I don't use palm much any more, but from what I understand you need to remelt and stir each time before you use it.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

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Linda
I know the voices in my head aren't real, but they sure have some great ideas!

The Oleic Fatty Acid in the Palm Oil will sink to the bottom of the container as the oil solidifies and the other fatty acids will float to the top. If the Palm Oil is just scooped out from the top of the container, you get a soft soap but as you get to the bottom of the container, you'll find you get a harder bar of soap because the Oleic Fatty Acid has sunk down.
So, when using a 5 gallon or larger bucket of oil, you can either set it out in the sun to melt (a friend of mine sets hers in the car with the windows up and waits) then separate it into smaller, more manageable containers, OR you can try digging a hole down into the Palm Oil and start scooping the oil out from the bottom going to the top, so that you (hopefully) have a mix of the complete oil.

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Remember, it's not just that we weather the storm, but how we dance in the rain.

Tammy

I hate melting the oil each time, so I tend to melt the entire bottle then pour it all into a bucket. Then I stir every 15 minutes or so until the oil has solidified. This is an all day process sometimes. But, then I can just scoop out what I need for a batch.

Ugh, I purchased a 35lb bucket of palm and damned if I can figure out how to melt it, and mix it well. So here it sits while I stare at it and make no soap! Stupid money saving huge buckets... BUT it is 90* outside, maybe I'll go stick it in the sun! Thanks for the idea!

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

The 5 gallon (35 lb) buckets fit into a hot water canner. It's not too bad to melt the whole thing.

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Linda

I learn so much when I can't leave well enough alone!

You can purchase no stir palm oil which has been hydrogenated so you don't have to melt it each time.

If you need to melt a 35 lb pail as a one off - then you could try duct taping a heating pad around it and keep it on high for 5-6 hours. You'll need to reset it every ~2 hours as the heating pads these days have auto off. If you're melting regularly, you can order a "high temp" Pail Warmer that is used for keeping chaulk warm at 115F for people building homes in cold weather. $86 incl shipping for the one I have. That way, you can melt it to separate or even for each time you use it.

I see that this is an older post, but in case people are still looking for ways to heat large buckets of palm oil... I just broke down a 50-lb bucket of palm oil into smaller containers, melting and stirring first so it's all mixed and distributed into all of the smaller containers. What I did was place the 50-lb. bucket in a bathtub, then added 4 large (very clean!) stainless steel pots and split up the palm oil between the 5 containers, then filled the tub with hot water. Also placed a space-heater in the bathroom and closed the door. I changed the water every hour or two (putting in new hot water) and stirred when it all got soft enough, then mixed it all up and separated into several smaller containers that I will be more easily able to melt when I soap. It was pretty much an all-day process - but not constant, just monitoring every hour or two, then mixing all, splitting it up, then cleaning up pans etc. It was HOT in my bathroom, so not pleasant, but I know I saved a LOT of money by purchasing the larger bucket, and can't afford a big bucket-warmer right now.

Another thought I had was that one could wrap the bucket in an electric blanket for several hours, keep checking and stirring every couple hours until melted, then split into smaller containers.

Hope this is helpful for someone!