Teach Soap

I made liquid soap over the weekend and it was a total flop! I melted my oils in a crockpot, added the KOH/water solution, blended it with a stick blender until it was very thick and let it cook for about 3 hours, stirring it down every 30 minutes. The finished paste was translucent and did not zap. The next morning I added my distilled water and let it cook in the crockpot, stirring once in a while to get the paste mixed in. I ended up with what (I thought) was a really nice clear liquid soap, but as it cooled it solidified and looked exactly like the sticky paste I started with, except now I had over twice as much!!!

So, what did I do wrong? Here is my recipe, which I ran through the Soapmaker software:
Olive oil 9oz
coconut oil 5oz
castor oil 2oz
KOH 3.26oz
water 8.78 oz
After the cook, I added 20 oz distilled water to the finished paste to dilute it.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

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

I make liquid soap and add more water then that. I don't have my notes in front of me, but I believe my ratio was 30:70 (paste to water). I would take a small amount of the paste, weigh it, then add the same amount of water and see if that works for you. Liquid soap can be tricky, as different oils react differently. Good luck!

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

I bought some liquid soap (potassium soap) recently from a local surfactants company and it came as 20% concentrate. At that concentration I find it is really strong. I agree with SoapBuddy that probably your concentration is still too high for it to stay liquid. If it doesn't zap, that shows your saponification worked ok.

No zap. Guess I'll make another attempt with lots more water! Thanks!

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

Can she put it back into the crock pot, heat it back up and add more water?

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

thats wonderful, no waste .

Linda I don't do liquid soap but have read some about it. I was wondering if adding more water to your base has helped? May I ask what color it is naturally and do you color and fragrance it after it is in liquid form? Hope it works out! Pics!!!

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂

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

I made another batch of liquid soap paste yesterday and it went very well - I was so excited! I cooked it until neutral and translucent - it looked perfect until I added my distilled water to dilute the paste. Now it's cloudy, but it lathers well and works like it should. Does anyone have any ideas as to what happened? Thanks!

My recipe:
7 oz Olive oil
5 oz Coconut oil
4 oz Castor oil
3.27 oz KOH (1% lye discount)
10.91 oz water

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

Some oils like castor will make liquid soap cloudy. Try just coconut with 0% superfat, dilute, then add a small amount of turkey red or glycerin.

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

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

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

Liquid soap is by far the most used in my area, found in every bathroom.
My own experiments with making liquid soap resulted in products I found to be inferior to the synthetic "soaps".
I have decided to formulate a synthetic instead. It's much easier, for me anyway, TBH.

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