Just a curious question for maybe a chemist type about LYE

[Rhonda]

In CP soap. Will the (acid) Lye kill off all the vitamins and nutrients that are in the nice oils and butters? Like say unrefined shea. I would hate to use these ingredients and have all the nutrients taken out during the process. So is there a chemist type out there that knows the answer to this? Or someone who has researched this. I tried and couldn't find anything.

Thanks

Rhonda

[MissMary]

From what I've read in these forums - lye is what makes soap, well soap. Considering it's used it every recipe here almost (or a spin off of) and people routinely critique their own formulas as very moisturizing etc. and the soap calculator tools here give numbers that, with lye, produce certain numbers related to lathering, moisturizing, etc. my best bet is no.

I suggest searching a lot more stuff on here in the recipes section.

[CareBear]

It depends. Many vitamins are pH dependent. Not gonna have much ascorbic acid (vit C) around at a pH of 10 . But they aren't really absorbed through the skin anyway. "Nutrients" I can't say much about.

[jbren]

Soap is a wash-off product. You can have a nice conditioning bar using shea or cocoa butter or other nice oils, but nothing is going to moisturize...it will clean without ripping your skin off.

Soap is meant to clean...period. You are better off saving your expensive oils/butters for lotion or cream for after bathing.

[Rhonda]

Oh okay.. so in soaping I would purchase the cheaper refined stuff. I have all the best organic oils and butters because I make lotions for myself. And I was thinking I was going to use that in my soaps. But I'm glad I saw another post saying that all the nutrients were leached out of fresh avocado (someone wanted to use this in their soap). I just never really thought about this. I also do melt and pour at this point and always figured that any of the synthetic/chemicals that may be in the base were not going to be absorbed into the skin anyway, since common sense says it is a wash off product. But...at the same time I have seen people advertise their CP soap as having vitamins and nutrients etc.. So I just assumed with CP there were still vitamins left in it. I guess added after trace is the only time you can get the vitamins/nutrients to stay alive right? Unless the PH is off. Anyway, thanks for your reply.. It's nice that a couple of you took the time to reply to me.

Rhonda

[jbren]

Rhonda...I used unrefined shea & cocoa butters in some of my recipes. They make nice soap. What is left of any nutrients is questionable. They, along with things like pureed avocado, cucumber, aloe, carrots, etc. certainly add label appeal to your soap, but I don't know that there is any proof that any of their original properties come thru.

As far as adding after trace...there have been many and varied opinions on this. Lye doesn't discriminate, so adding anything before it does it's 'thing' in saponification, I believe, is futile.

Now, HP...that's another subject up for discussion re: superfatting oils.

[Camay]

In CP soap. Will the (acid) Lye kill off all the vitamins and nutrients that are in the nice oils and butters?

Just a quick note... lye is not an acid, it is a base, a very strong one at that.