Teach Soap

I am trying to get the beautiful Fine Iridescent Glitter from Brambleberry to suspend in my Aloe spritzer... it is clumping on the wall of the bottle at the very top instead of suspending in my sprtizer. Any ideas. The only change I have made to my recipe is reducing the aloe by half and replacing with water.

Probably the water is the issue, since glitter floats!

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~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

I was afraid of that. Thanks!

You'll have to use a polymer thickener such as Carbopol Ultrez-20 to get that to be stable. 0.15% should do it.

Make sure you use a good preservative too!

_________________
~~Heather~~
Mad [soaping] Scientist

Im new to this... a polymer thickner? Will that make it difficult to spritz because of texture/thickness or just allow enough of a bond for the h2o to suspend the glitter?

A polymer thickener when used at low % levels - that's why I suggested no more than 0.15% - won't cause problems spraying it. You're just after stability, that's all. I found that BB's glitter and micas always end up migrating to either the top or the bottom of the bottle, even in a thick shampoo. It might take a couple of weeks, but it will, and it is not an attractive product when that's happened.

Carbopol Ultrez-20 is very easy to use. You just sprinkle it on top of the water, let it self-wet for five minutes, then mix in (at slow speed so as not to fill with bubbles). The very last thing you do after adding the glitter or mica, is to neutralise the Carbopol with the required amount of sodium hydroxide. Then it becomes a suspension.

I'd try using 0.1% first. You'll need a sensitive scale! 0.1% in 1Kg of product is only 1 gram. Most hobby suppliers have Carbopol and I bet you already have the sodium hydroxide. If you try it, don't buy much! A little goes a very long way. It's a very safe product, used in many personal care products, mainly creams and shampoos, and of course hair gels rely on it.