Teach Soap

Trying to calculate the weight of oils I need for my 9 bar wooden mold from BB. But when I check my math I come up with 4lbs total, but the sites says 2-3lbs. Can you guys see a mistake?

(2+2+2)(3+3+3)(2)=108
(108)(0.39)=42.12

Plugged 42.12oz oils into soapcalc and came up with 16.001oz liquid and 5.860z lye. This is a 5% SF recipe.

42.12+16.001+5.86=63.981
63.981oz / 16oz=3.998lbs

Wanting to test this mold this week to be sure that the dividers are going to work properly but need to figure this out first!

Thanks guys!

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

Their mold height is 3 7/16" tall. Most of us don't have soaps that are this tall.

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

I did my soaps 2X2X3 inches in that calculation. That's the max bar size they suggest in the PDF. But in the same paragraph it says 2-3 lbs. 9 bars of that size is a 4lb batch.

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

According to my calculations, the most this mold can hold is 6.75 lbs. That would be filled to the very brim. This would include all your soap oils and all your water. So you should be able to use a 4 lb. batch of soap with no problems. 2x2x3
(x 9) bars calculation comes way off for me.

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

Have no sage insight....still learning the calculation thing myself.
However, just wanted to suggest maybe contacting BB? Each time I've called/emailed with a question they've been super helpful! (Of course that does mean you'd have to wait until Monday, which may or may not be in your plans.....) And when you DO figure it out, can you share the "right" answer and how to get it? Might shed some light on the process for the rest of us .

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Carrie
Wife to my Best Friend and Homeschool mom to 7 beautiful gifts

Another way to look at it is 9 bars times 4 oz ea equal the oils then there is the water. Your calc looks like 32 oz of oils and the remainder water to me! If you use the plastic liners and dividers they do not go to the top of the mold. There is 1/4 inch or so for the lid to sit in the mold. If you are using a plastic bag type liner or paper liner and fill it to the rim well then you could use more soap. HTH

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂

I ended up re-calculating with 1.5" thick bars. Turned out exactly 3 lbs! Just didn't have my mind working right earlier I guess!! The soap is in the mold now!

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

Photos!

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~bytheSEAsoap~ Mella bythesea, bythesea, bythebeautiful sea

海の皂

Will put one up when I figure out how to unmold it. But its just a plain soap, no colour or swirls. Which is great because boy it moved FAST!

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

Soap porn is soap porn! No ifs ands or buts about it.

Besides, I have the 9-bar mold on its way to me right now so I'm glad you got the math figured out for me ahead of time in figuring out the batch size I hope it unmolds easily.

Oh yeah, here is the breakdown I used, for 1.5" thick bars:

31.59 oz oils
12.01 oz liquid
4.39 oz lye

And for reference that is 27.22g sodium lactate used at 2%.

Now I just have to figure out how to get the soap out of the mold LOL, I checked it last night and it was 75% gelled, this morning it looks like it completely gelled.

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

Here is the formula that i use....

L x W x H x .4 = The amount of oz in oils you need...so far the only time it over caculates is when I make a salt bar. All that added volume in salt.

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

That is the same formula I used in both steps above! I just didn't round the 0.39 up to 0.4. I like to keep the decimals until the last step.... was nailed into my head in university physics LOL Keep the decimals!!

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

I use this mold all the time. I love it! I usually make 1000g batches, I find that 1000g in this mold gives me generaously sized bars, almost up to the top of the dividers.

I see in the share thread that you got it unmolded, and the soap looks great. One thing that I've figured out is that if I use plastic trashbags to line the mold, I can just gather up the corners and pull the whole things out, then I put the cover back on the mold, put the soap on the cover upside down, peel off the plastic liner, and then shift the soap to the edge of the cover and slide the sides down and off the soap. Then I shift some more so that an entire third of the soap is over the edge, and I push those bars down to unmold. Then I turn the whole thing around and unmold the other side the same way. By this time, gravity starts to help me out and the dividers start to slide on their own.

All in all, best mold ever, I think.

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You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus – Mark Twain
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