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I've made many batches of castile soap before, and there's never been a problem. Apparently I got too confident, because now there's a problem. Two problems, really: there's a fine beading of liquid lye on top of the slab, and also there's a bit of surface cracking here and there. What I don't know is where the problem occurred, and how to fix it.
1. Ingredients
I made my batch using the SoapCalc lye calculator. I only had 2688 grams of olive oil in my possession, so that's what I used, and I was very careful to measure the oil, lye, and water correctly. VERY careful. 5% superfat, 38% water.
2. Temperatures
Based on information from another website, which by now I've forgotten, I did not wait for my lye to cool down or my oil to heat up, but added the lye to the oil almost right away. I know that when I add ice cubes or cool water to piping hot tea, rather than waiting for the tea to cool, it reaches a satisfactory temperature immediately, so I thought this would be acceptable. This may be where the problem originated, and if so, I won't be surprised.
3. Batch size
Normally I make 1800 to 2000 grams of soap at a time, but this time I wanted to try out an ersatz slab mold I made, so I used all my available olive oil. It's possible that the larger batch retained heat longer than a smaller batch would do, so maybe this is the issue.
4. Environment
It's been hot and humid outside, but the air conditioning has kept my apartment around 75F to 80F and with slightly lower humidity. I don't have a humidity gauge, though, so I can't say exactly how much there might be. Still, I had the windows open until after I poured the soap into the mold just to keep the ventilation going, so this might or might not be the situation.
5. Trace
I poured at medium trace. I've been known to pour at thin, medium, and thick trace, with no odd or ill effects.
6. Treatment of slab
The mold is made of cardboard (a USPS Flat Rate box, the kind that's only 3.5" tall and about 11.5"l x 13.5"w. I lined it with freezer paper, as I always do. After the soap was poured, I covered the batch by stretching cling film over the whole box, rather than pressing it down onto the soap's surface like I normally do. This also might be part of the problem. Then I wrapped it in a crocheted blanket and stuck it on the top shelf in my kitchen, where the cats couldn't reach it.
7. Waiting
I made the soap on Friday afternoon. Since it was the Sabbath, I couldn't check it or do anything to it until Saturday night. When Sabbath was over, I checked, and the mold was still warm on the bottom. I left it until about half an hour ago, then checked again. The bottom of the box is now cool, so I peeled off the cling film. That was when I noticed the droplets of what I hoped were water. No such luck. The zap test zapped me, but good. (I spat a lot and put lemon juice on my tongue until it stopped burning.)
8. Handling
Because I had to take the soap down from the tall shelf to check it both times, I wonder if my hands under the heavy, soft, half-hardened soap managed to deform it. Maybe the very tiny crack is just a result of that physical change, and not something chemical such as overheating during the gel phase.
So. Did I wait too long to check the soap? Not long enough? What caused the problem(s)?
And more importantly, how do I fix them? Is it enough just to wipe/rinse off the lye from the top, or is this batch too caustic throughout, despite the religious zeal with which I approach measurements? If it's too caustic, can I cure it and rebatch it with additional oils to eat up the excess lye?
Last edited by Ipstenit on Sun Aug 05, 2012 2:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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