well i learned a new lesson

[Jo Ann]

its not the best idea to use both shea and mowrah butter in one recipe. i did 5% of each and made the superfat 4%. should have made it 3% its kinda soft and a bit sticky after sitting cut and out to air for 24 hours.

[Jo Ann]

well the stickyness is gone but its pretty soft, but i washed my hands and face with a piece and it felt pretty nice. nice creamy lather and all. here the ingredients

castor 10%

coconut 30%

Lard 25%

Olive 25%

mowrah butter 5%

shea butter 5%

1/2 cup aloe vera gel 100% added at the end of cooking.

[Meridith]

I didn't run your numbers but I've soaped with both mowrah and shea and my soap was not soft. Because you did not use high amounts of them, my guess would be it is the aloe vera gel that is making it soft. Or a combo of it and the OO since OO can take some time to harden up. The stickiness could have been caused by the gel too as well as your castor oil. I never use more than 5% castor oil in my soap because of the stickiness I experience with it when used higher than 5% Give it time and it may harden up nicely. But as long as it was a nice conditioning soap with wonderful lather, I would not worry too much about it - especially if its for personal use.

[Jo Ann]

thanx meridith, I usually use aloe and it never caused stickiness before, so its probably one of the other you mentions. I was thinking about going 5 percent of castor myself. i also forgot to add that i put in titanium dioxide too, for the first time, and may have added a bit too much. but it not sure how much i should use for 2 pound soap batch.

I do hope it hardens a bit more, cuz someone at work wants to buy most of it (but i told her she would have to use it within 6 mths [me being on the safe side]) many not want to buy too much.

also i want to make a batch that will be my basic soap batch. so that once i come up with that and am consistent with making it, i'll feel free to start experimenting with coloring. I do leave it in its rough state since its "homemade" and no one has a problem with that thank goodness.

[topofmurrayhill]

I was thinking the same thing. It's hard to imagine that combining the two butters would have any special weird effect. The castor and aloe seem like possible contributors. Also if the real SAP value of the oils was higher than your calculator's assumptions, and/or the lye was a little damp, the superfat could have been higher than you intended. Those are all things I would suspect first.

[CareBear]

I cannot imagine that recipe giving you sticky soap; even with the 10% castor, it's a lot of hard oils. I believe it's the aloe gel you added after the cook. that stuff is sticky all by itself.

[Carrie]

When I changed my recipe to 10% castor the soaps stayed mushy/soft for a couple of weeks before getting hard. When I changed back to 5% castor, they hardened up right away.

[Scented]

Actually with 65% hard oils, can't imagine it being mushy at all. 10%castor left me thinking my recipe was a little sticky, but it didn't show up till the fourth week of a six-week cure. Don't think that's your culprit here though.

[Jo Ann]

actually the stickiness left one side the second day and when i flipped the soap over, it was gone the 3rd day. I use aloe vera and it never made my soap sticky before, thats why i thought i might be shea and mowrah. my soap is still sorta soft. but workes well. except for the softness, i like how it turned out. but i think if i give it a few more days it wll harden a bit more.