Is it me or this recipe

[Loretta]

I am quite new to soapmaking, I have made several batches which have worked. I am trying different recipes using different oils and butters to see which I like bst and choose which one I want to use regularly as my basic one.

I used this recipe on Sunday

1lb 5 1/2 oz coconut oil

1lb 7 3/4 oz sunflower oil

1lb 7 3/4 oz oilive oil

8 1/2 oz caustic soda

32 3/4 fl oz water

I did what I always do but as soon as I added the lye water to the oil it was different, it seemed very liquid and it seemed to take much longer to reach trace than any of the other recipes I have used. I was going to unmold it 24 hours later but it was very soft and sticky so I left it another 24 hours and it was still soft and sticky but I managed to get it out of the mold. I have left it drying now but I am not sure if it is going to change or take a long time to start going hard.

I probably won't use this recipe again I will go back to the ones that did work but I want to know if this recipe should have worked.

I hope all this makes sense!

[LovelyLathers]

Did you create this recipe or find it somewhere? From what I see you have about 69% soft oils so it will make your soap very soft. I never use more the 15 to 20% sunflower most of the time I only use 10% It will make a very soft soap. Between the OO and sunflower it would be a very slow tracer. I also do not use co as more than 20% of my oils as it can be drying, IMO. I ran this through the Soapmaker Cal. and I come up with 9.82 oz of lye at 6% superfat or at 0% it is 10.45 oz. Water I come up with 24.35 oz with no discount. If you use that recipe I would easily do a 33% solution. If you found this recipe on the internet did you run it through a calculator? It may not harden up at all due to the ratio of oils, lye and water, imo.

[Scented]

Well I'm going to take a stab with this, because there's basically three ingredients (not counting lye and water). There's way more soft oils, so on soap calc it's basically showing that you have a hardness of 32 ... meaning it will become soap at some point, but not within 48 hours ... if you try again, leave it in the log/mold for a week or more and see what happens. You have coconut for your hard oil and that's it. Should be a good conditioning and bubbly bar with good cleansing properties, maybe a little on the high end ... it depends. The olive is a great conditioning oil and could counter any gruffness from the coconut.

Now see I use 25% coconut in my recipes lol, but I don't typically get a harshness from it.

[Angel91805]

Ditto what Sue and Julie have said.

I ran your numbers through soap calc too and to get to 8.5 oz of lye your superfat is at 17.9%!! :shocked2: Bodes high for DOS...IMO.

Did you get this recipe from somewhere? Do you know how to formulate recipes with a lye calculator?

Donna

[topofmurrayhill]

The ratio of oils is on the soft side but that's not the main problem. It's superfatted at 18% and uses a ratio of over 47% water to oils. That is definitely way more water than you want to have in there and I think you would have liked more lye too.

Basically your soap is sopping wet and has a lot of residual oils that didn't turn into soap. Me, I'd call it a mistake and pitch it, but if you're feeling patient you can try letting it cure and see what you get.

Run every recipe through a lye calculator before you make it.

[Loretta]

I got this recipe from a book by Tatyana Hill, there is a basic soap base recipe and a moisturising soap base recipe and from these 2 recipes there are then variations and it looked like a good idea to me. I used the recipe as it was.

When I have made other batches I have followed the recipes exactly and they have worked.

I do not know how to use the soapcal I have tried! and this is why I have followed an exact recipe. I thought if I learnt the technique I would then be able to figure out how to make up my own.

Although this hasn't worked I now understand what makes soap hard or soft. In the other recipes I have used palm oil, this is the first one where I have not used it.

Shall I just leave this in the mold for a couple of weeks and see what happens and keep an eye on it?

Thanks for all your help, I love making soap but I think it is going to take years before I get it right!!

[Scented]

Now see I would check it in about a week and see what progress it has made. I'm not expecting much, but I'd still see what happens.

The high superfat certainly will change the harshness of that coconut.

Ultimately it's up to you what you want to do, but this way you'll know a little more about what happens. Heck you could just stow it away for 4-6 weeks and it may turn out to be something really great. That's the joy of the experiment, but sometimes the results aren't always a joy.