Making Homemade Liquid Soap ~ Tutorial

10/5/2012

Learn how to make inexpensive natural or regular liquid soap for your family!

A few years ago, my family needed to make a big change in the kinds of soaps we used. You can read about why we left commercial soaps behind. It was one of the first attempts our family made toward more natural beauty and health products - and it was a huge success! It only took about 3 days for my daughter's hands to transform from very red, dry, itchy hands to normal, smooth hands. It was an amazing transformation, and we all noticed a big difference in how our hands felt in the middle of the winter!

The problem is that the price of the oils used to make healthy natural soap has risen significantly over the last year. The price of Dr. Bronner's Magic Liquid Castile Soap went from $10 per quart to $16 or more for the same amount of soap, all within about one year! And Dr. Bronner's bar soap went from $3.75 per bar to over $5 per bar, in the same length of time. Even though this soap is quite concentrated, that's just too expensive for us.

After doing quite a lot of research on the internet this summer, I decided to try to make my own soap. I cheated, though. I'll admit it - I went to a friend's house, and she taught the girls and I how to make our own bars of soap! (Thanks, Serena!) We made our soap with goat's milk, olive oil, coconut oil, and palm oil, I think.

Our skin has liked this soap, too, and it was quick and easy to make the bars of soap, enough to last a year - at least. And at around 75 cents per bar, this is a price that really appeals to me!

But we were still wanting to have some liquid soap that was healthy for our skin. Regular liquid soaps found in the grocery stores and shopping "marts" haven't gone through the traditional saponification process, so most commercial liquid soap is actually in the "detergent" category, not the soap category.

Strange, isn't it? You think you're using soap for your hands and in the shower, but you're actually using detergent. No wonder our skin reacts in such a negative way to so much of the soap on the market these days!

I spent a couple of days this summer researching how to make liquid castile soap for myself. I learned a lot, but still hadn't given it a try. Finally, because I got brave - um - really, because I was literally completely out of liquid soap one day, I decided I'd better use what I'd learned to make my own liquid soap.

Guess what? I learned that you can turn BAR SOAP into liquid soap!

It’s easy to convert bars of soap to liquid hand soap. All you'll need to do is to melt the grated soap in water, add some glycerin to the mixture, and wait a bit to get the consistency how you'd like it! If it's too thin, I'll help you figure out how to thicken it, and if it's too thick, I'll show you how to water it down. I found that one bar of soap made three-fourths of a gallon of liquid soap...and are you ready for this? For under a dollar! Plus, the liquid soap is so concentrated that in most cases, you'll have to dilute it with water. Amazing!

Here are some important points to keep in mind when making liquid soap from bars of soap:

1. If your skin needs a more natural soap, you'll want to look for a higher quality soap - not detergent. It will need to have gone through the saponification process. Detergent soaps are made from synthetic chemicals produced in a lab, usually from petroleum products. Non-detergent soaps are made from naturally-occurring ingredients such as water, animal fats, vegetable fats, lye, and sometimes, glycerin, although normally glycerin is a natural by-product of bar soap if it has been made and cooled correctly. Just look at the labels, and you'll see what not to buy if you have sensitive skin. I've heard that Kirk’s Castile Soap works well with these directions, but I haven't tried it yet.

Here's a list of ingredients found in Lever 2000 bar soap:

Stearic acid
Tetrasodium EDTA
2,6-Di-t-butyl-p-cresol (BHT)
Sodium isethionate
Trisodium etidronate
Triclosan
Disodium phosphate
Sodium chloride
Water
Sodium tallowate
Titanium dioxide
Coconut fatty acids
Sodium cocoate
Sodium cocoyl isethionate

You'll want to avoid soaps like Irish Spring, Palmolive, Dove, Ivory, etc. if you need something that will be a lot easier on your skin.

If you prefer to use Dove soap, you will need an entirely different recipe, found here: http://www.savvyhousekeeping.com/turn-a-bar-of-dove-soap-into-liquid-hand-soap/

2. If your skin isn't sensitive, and you just want to save money on purchasing liquid soap, you have more freedom to use a variety of soaps on the market. Avoid Dial or any soap that has a "softer" feel to it. Choose soaps that have a harder feel to them. Look at the list of ingredients on the label and don't purchase any soap that contains citric acid.

3. The price of the bar soap doesn't determine its quality. Yardley of London soaps ($1 at Dollar Tree and inexpensive at other stores) will work really well for this tutorial, if your skin can handle that type of soap. But you can also use homemade soaps that are more natural.

4. Don't expect this liquid soap to behave exactly like liquid soap from the stores. If you do, you will probably be disappointed. If you are willing to be flexible, you should be pretty happy with this soap. It may not lather up in the same way that commercial liquid soap does, where chemicals have often been added to make the soap extra "bubbly".

Ingredients:

1 cup of soap flakes (grated from a bar of soap of your choice)
10 cups water
1 Tbsp. glycerin
optional: a few drops of essential oil per smaller soap bottle once it is finished, if your skin can tolerate it

Tools You'll Need:

food processor or cheese grater
Dutch oven or stockpot (I used a 6-qt. size)
measuring cup; measuring spoons
wooden, metal, or heat-resistant spoon for stirring
soap container with a hand pump
jar or container to hold excess soap
funnel (helpful but not required)

Let's make homemade liquid soap!

First, grate up one bar of soap. There are several methods of doing this:

Method #1: Microwave

The first method I tried, in order to help grate the bar of soap with ease, was to microwave the bar of soap for 10 seconds or so. I saw numerous websites that suggested this method. Actually, some of the websites said to heat the bar of soap in a glass bowl in the microwave for several minutes, watching it carefully.

    They said that in a few minutes, the bar of soap would start to foam up as the air inside the bar of soap expanded. I was supposed to take the soap out of the microwave when the foaming stopped. As the soap cooled, the foam was supposed to crumble into small particles, or could be placed into a food processor to get the crumbled pieces into finer bits.

    Take my word for it. If you leave the soap in the microwave for a few minutes, you'll not only be buying yourself a new microwave, but you may end up buying yourself a new house. And you won't have to worry about having friends, in-laws, or out-laws coming over to visit for the next twenty years. The smell of burning soap is horrendous!

    So, for the second time around, I reduced the power level to 60% and set it for two minutes. After about 30 seconds, I could tell that it was going to start burning again if I didn't remove it from the microwave soon.

    Like in about 1.3 nanoseconds.

    I don't recommend this method. Your house will stink; your family will not thank you. You will probably end up wasting at least one bar of soap. And maybe at least one microwave. No thanks.

Method #2: Cheese grater

Grate the soap using the medium to medium-fine size of a cheese grater. Be aware that the soap particles are very light and may float in the air. Try not to breathe in any of the flakes. The grated soap flakes should look like the consistency of grated Parmesan cheese. Or, grate using the large setting/side, and finish up the process by placing the grated soap into a food processor for a minute or two to convert it to small flakes.

Method #3: Food Processor

Use a food processor: first, cut up the soap into smaller chunks with a regular knife and a cutting board; then, place the pieces of soap into the food processor. You will probably want to use the shredding disk or blade to grate the soap, but if you know your regular blade will grate hard cheeses well, you could possibly use your regular blade to grate the soap.

After you have grated up one bar of soap, measure 1 cup of soap flakes. Place any extra soap flakes into a container or zip bag for future use. (Can you see yourself frugally saving those small soap scraps or those extra hotel soaps or gifts of bar soap until you have enough to make 1 cup of powdered soap?)

In a large pot, combine in this exact order:

1 cup soap flakes
10 cups of cool water
1 Tbsp. glycerin

Over medium-low to medium heat (it will depend on your stove), stir the soap mixture until the soap flakes have completely dissolved. This will probably take about 10-15 minutes. Do not let the soap boil! I have a very inexpensive electric range, so I needed to turn the heat up to medium in order to get the soap flakes to melt completely. Your range may heat liquids faster, so watch closely.

Warming up and melting the soap flakes

Cooling liquid soap after flakes have dissolved

When the soap flakes have completely dissolved into the water/glycerin mixture, you'll notice that the liquid soap is the consistency of water. At this point, DO NOT POUR THE LIQUID SOAP INTO YOUR SOAP CONTAINERS! The soap isn't quite ready to be used. If you pour it into your containers right away, and it becomes very thick, you might not be able to get the thickened soap out of the containers so you can thin it down.

Let the soap cool completely. If the cooled liquid soap has the consistency of water, let it sit out for 12-24 hours. It should thicken up nicely, and it may also have a pearl sheen to it, depending on the type of soap you chose to use. Next time I make this soap, I'm going to let it sit for about 12 hours, to see if it makes a difference. (It's okay to stir it once in a while, to check the consistency of it.)

Liquid soap after 24 hours of resting

Liquid soap after 48 hours of resting

    Here's the thing. I don't normally talk like this, but this is the only way I can think of for you to understand the consistency of the soap after 24-48 hours: snotty. Snot-like. Like snot. Blech!

    And no, I didn't let my children talk like this when they were younger. But that's because they're girls. And I'm female. If they had been boys, and my husband was in charge of the boys for the day, well, who knows?

    Heh-heh.

    But that's really the only way to explain the viscosity of the liquid soap. It's just plain odd.

    Now, here's the part where you'll need to be flexible. If your liquid soap seems too thin, you can follow some or all of the suggestions found below. If your liquid soap seems too thick, you can thin it with water, or you can dilute it greatly and use it in a foaming soap dispenser.

If your cooled liquid soap seems too thin:

Option #1: Stir 3 tablespoons of table salt into 8 oz. (1 cup) hot water until dissolved. Whisk a small amount - a tablespoon at a time - of the salt solution into the cooled runny soap mixture until the soap reaches the thickness you prefer. You might find that you need more of the salt solution to help thicken up the soap. Let the soap sit for another 8-12 hours, if needed.

Option #2: If your liquid soap is still too runny, use your hand blender or hand mixer to blend the soap. You'll be surprised at how quickly it will become thick and creamy.

Option #3: There's always going to be an odd one in each bunch. If your soap is still too thin, bring the mixture to a boil (no lid needed). Skim off any bubbles or suds as it boils. Allow the soap to boil for a minute or two; then, remove the pot of liquid soap from the heat and set it aside to settle and cool. This may take a few hours.

Option #4: Add some xanthan gum to the liquid soap. I haven't tried this, so I can't give you any advice on how to use it.

    In my case, I let the soap sit for 48 hours (I used homemade goat milk, olive oil, and coconut oil bar soap), and it had thickened up nicely without being overly thick. However, to reduce the snot-like consistency of the soap, I went ahead and used my hand mixer to try to blend it a bit better. I think it would have been better if I had only let it sit for 12-24 hours at the most. You may find that you just need to experiment with it a little bit.

The liquid soap should be thicker and "snot-like" by this time. If you don't like the snot-like consistency of the soap, get out your hand mixer, stick blender, or whisk. Carefully and slowly blend the soap together until the consistency is more like typical liquid soap. Watch those beaters, though! The soap wanted to "climb" the beaters and show the mixer who was boss! I didn't want the soap to get up inside the mixer.

Watch closely so the soap doesn't begin to form lots of bubbles on its surface. But if you accidentally mixed it too long with the hand mixer, like I did, and you now have bubbles soaring out your kitchen window, no worries. It will settle back down in about four hours. Ask me how I know.

One more thing: once you feel your soap is at the thickness you prefer, I recommend leaving 2" head space or more at the top of the soap dispenser. This way, if the soap seems too thick, you have room in the dispenser to add some additional water and shake it up well. If the soap seems too thin, you can add a bit more liquid soap and shake to blend. See? Flexibility is the key here. It's like a science experiment!

I just {heart} storing things in glass canning jars, especially the half-gallon size! If you choose to store your liquid soap in a canning jar, it would probably be best to use a plastic lid, not a regular metal canning lid, due to the pH of the liquid soap. I can't promise you that a metal lid will rust, but the metal rings did get a bit rusty when we had originally purchased homemade liquid soap from an acquaintance.

You can also store your liquid soap in well-rinsed milk jugs or distilled water jugs, but I don't recommend this. Those jugs are not designed for long-term storage. I've heard of people finding burst jugs in a basement. With water, it would be a nuisance, but can you even imagine trying to clean up a large puddle of liquid soap? Ugh.

After two weeks of using this homemade liquid soap, how do we feel about it?

See this beautiful, glass foamy soap dispenser? This is the ultimate, best soap dispenser I've ever used that is designed to save $ by turning diluted liquid soap into foamy, bubbly soap. I've tried Pampered Chef's version, another brand I don't recall, and have even purchased and emptied out the liquid soap from a Dial brand soap foamy dispenser. This particular soap dispenser in the photo came from Bed, Bath, and Beyond, and we have really enjoyed using them. We have one in a bathroom, and one in the kitchen. We've generally added 1" of undiluted liquid soap and filled the rest of it with water.

Unfortunately, it isn't working very well with our homemade liquid soap, even diluted. It's hard to push on the hand pump most of the time. If the soap is too diluted, then it doesn't feel like it is cleansing our hands. If the soap is at the dilution it needs to be, it's too thick to work well in the dispenser.

    At this stage of the game, since I now have almost a gallon of liquid soap, I'm definitely not going to call it quits and assume that there's something wrong with the soap. It's just not working as well in a foaming soap dispenser. I'm going to check our local Goodwill store to see if I can find a gently used soap dispenser (non-foaming), or I'll purchase an inexpensive bottle of liquid hand soap and empty it out to try it with our new homemade soap.

    I'll let you know what I find out. Should this soap be a bit more inconvenient to use around the house, we're still going to use it until it's gone. I'd really enjoy trying to make a batch of this with Yardley of London's Lavender bar soap, to see how it interacts and works, but I haven't decided yet. I've heard online that Yardley of London soaps work really well, even though they are made from a long list of chemicals and possibly haven't gone through the full saponification process. It might not work so well for my own family's hands, but it might be a nice gift for someone else.

    If you decide to give this a try, I'd enjoy hearing how it went for you! Just leave a note in the comments section and share with us the type of bar soap you used and how it is working (or not working). Or, if you already make homemade liquid soap and have a different technique that works better for you, please let us know!

    The way this soap feels on our hands is different than the liquid hand soap we've used in the past. But I do believe it's going to work well enough for us that it will be worth spending 30 minutes of time every 6 months to make a new batch of homemade liquid soap!

Julieanne
Joy In Our Journey.com

36 Comments

Lori

10/6/2012 06:18:35 am

I didn't bring my own soap with me, two weeks ago, today, and used an unknown in a public restroom and my hands have been itching ever since! Ach! Thank you, Julieanne, you are such a generous giver of information!

Julieanne link

10/13/2012 03:08:19 pm

I don't seem to be as sensitive as some people in our family, but my skin does get dry with other types of soap. I try to stick with the castile soap or goat milk soap, etc. as much as possible, but thankfully if I go out somewhere else that doesn't have it, it doesn't mess up my hands too badly.

Cyndi

10/6/2012 06:19:41 am

Thank-you, this was just the topic on a homesteading forum I belong to.

Julieanne link

10/6/2012 06:22:38 am

You're welcome, Cyndi. I stayed up late to finish this tutorial, but I've been having friends and relatives begging me for the directions - with photos.

Cyndi

10/6/2012 06:20:27 am

When I wake up this morning, yikes, I was planning on going to the forum to see if they had posted the instructions on how to make soap. Some of them even make their own make up. The whole topic was on money saving tips and I realized I am not good at saving money.

Julieanne link

10/6/2012 06:23:27 am

Well, to be able to make 3/4ths of a gallon of liquid hand soap, that probably still needs to be diluted some more with water, for about $1 - $2, is VERY frugal! You'll have to give it a try!

Brandi

5/11/2013 12:38:37 am

I followed the recipe and have let it set for more than 12hrs and it's still runny like water. I also added the salt water to thicken it but no difference so far. I was hoping to give these as Mother's day gift but I'm not sure its going to happen this year. Hopefully letting it boil more to evaporate some of the water will help. Any other suggestions?

Julieanne link

5/13/2013 02:19:36 am

Brandi, did you try leaving the soap out for 24 hours or 48 hours? Have you used a hand mixer with it? What kind of bar soap did you choose to use? Let me know how things turned out. Thanks!

Brandi

5/16/2013 12:41:45 pm

I let it set for over 24hrs before I gave up. I tried the salt tip, reheating, mixer etc. The only thing I can think of, is the bar of soap was completely organic. It was soy based and only had four or five other ingredients. However **silver lining*** I plan on using the liquid as bubble bath.

Julieanne link

5/16/2013 03:33:58 pm

Brandi, I'm sorry the recipe didn't work for you. I wonder if it was because it was made with soy? I've used both homemade goat milk soap and homemade castile (olive oil) soap, and they have both turned out really well.

Robert link

1/31/2014 01:30:58 pm

How'd it work as bubble bath, Brandi?

Julieanne link

2/1/2014 04:49:53 am

Robert, I don't know if Brandi saw your question. Just making a guess here...I personally don't think this would make great bubble bath, since it doesn't have the added chemicals that make soaps "extra bubbly". Our liquid hand soap as described here on this page is definitely not bubbly...or only just a tiny bit. It took some getting used to. But who knows? Maybe this would work for bubble bath. I haven't tried it that way, and my guess is that it wouldn't do so well for that.

brandi

2/1/2014 06:00:34 am

Unfortunately it was a complete bust. It didn't work for me as a soap or bubble bath. Maybe it was the soap I used but it was a process I am not interested in repeating.

Julieanne link

2/1/2014 04:30:19 pm

Brandi, I'm so sorry that you were disappointed about how your soap turned out. I'm 100% positive that because you used a soy-based soap, this is why it didn't convert well to a liquid soap. It doesn't sound like you're willing to try this again, and I understand. However, if you ever get in a position where you must have natural, healthy liquid soap at a lower price, I do hope you'll give this a try again with a soap made from olive oil, or goat's milk combined with olive oil or coconut oil or palm oils.

Robert link

2/2/2014 01:22:33 am

I didn't expect to read that it worked as bubble bath. This sequence has been repeated many times online because soap (actual soap soap) has been recommended for use as the foaming material in bubble bath. You CAN make a bath foamy if you use ENOUGH soap to overcome all the "hardness" in a whole bathtubful of water, which can be an awful lot, and indeed some people used to do that with soap powder or flakes. The result is a bath which actually gets you clean without additional soap, but which is very defatting to skin and much more irritating than a bath foamed with the soapless materials used in bubble baths. The latter aren't much impaired by water "hardness" and foam at concentrations much lower than would be necessary to get skin or hair clean.

About a decade ago I heard from someone who was working on overcoming this problem, and thought she could formulate from soap a reasonably nonirritating bath foam that would work without need to "soften" the water, but I heard nothing about her progress and rather doubt the chances of success.

As you can see from the Web page linked from my comment, I'm an expert on this subject. If you want to use actual soap soap to make lots of foam in a bath, do it by blowing thru a soapy washcloth or the way done in a Turkish bath to cover a PERSON in suds rather than to lay a blanket of foam on the bath water. Since you're using only a small amount of water in the process (whatever the cloth holds), you don't need a lot of soap. And you can do it in the shower!

Julieanne link

2/2/2014 04:00:09 pm

Thank you, Robert, for your helpful and interesting comments about soap and bubble bath.

diana link

9/11/2013 11:34:12 pm

as my soap is sitting the more it cools the thinker it gets until i stir it. I' m wondering if I put it int a squeeze bottle with a small opening if it will get to thinck to use. Should I make it a lot thinner?

Julieanne link

1/1/2014 02:34:03 pm

It sounds like your liquid soap is doing just fine! How did it turn out for you after all?

Andin

9/30/2014 05:50:46 pm

I did it differently.
- 1 soap bar (80gr-the cheapest in store)
- 3 cups of water
- 1/2-3/4 of cooking oil
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 3 tbsp milk powder

Result: creamy texture.
Oil is used to make the soap mix with water once it's done. Sugar is for lathering. Milk will soften the texture, very close to commercial products. Unfortunately, it also decrease lathers.
If milk is excluded, the texture will still be creamy - not as soft though. Or, sometimes, I add 2 tbsp liquid body wash into this recipe to increase lathers

Julieanne link

10/1/2014 06:23:38 am

Interesting, Andin! Thank you for sharing your "recipe". I'm wondering what the measurement is for the oil? Tbsp? tsp? Cups? If I used this recipe, I'd use melted coconut oil or olive oil, not what most Americans consider "cooking oil" (canola or vegetable oil). I'd also probably leave out the sugar because it can absorb into the skin, and I'm trying to eliminate sugar in my life. :) It looks interesting to give it a try, though! :)

Tammy

2/19/2015 02:37:24 pm

if you use milk powder can you use goats milk powder and do you have to refrigerate it?

andin

10/1/2014 08:36:50 am

Hi julieanne, the.measurement is cup. I used palm oil for it's the common oil used in my country. But I've used coconut, rice bran, and almond oil before, and they're good too. I have to remind you, if you use milk, it has to be refrigerated.
Don't worry, if you eliminate the milk, the texture will still be good. The end result will be like Dove-even though I didn't use Dove. It's because the oil added.
Don't use mixer when it's cool, you'd want to know whether the texture already fit to your liking, so you could decide whether you want to add more water or not.
I use it as hand, body, and face wash! I have an extreme dry skin and this homemade soap is the only one that doesn't dry out. It's nice how we could have high quality soap in a very cheap price, huh? Good luck!!

Annie

12/30/2014 07:54:56 am

I make my foaming hand soap using Castile liquid baby mild soap and even some essential oils and it works great in the foaming pumps I've used for me and a different container and foaming pumps for family as gifts. In both containers, they foam comes out creamier and softer than any of the store bought versions. I'm wondering if it is something to do with using regular soap and the extra stuff that goes into the bars.

Julieanne link

12/30/2014 09:45:53 am

I think you're right, Annie!

Amber

2/3/2015 12:21:41 am

I want to thank you for your post, it was SO helpful to me!
The liquid soap I made turned out way yucky, even after waiting 48+ hours for it to "gel up." Your blending trick didn't help, but the salt worked wonders! Here's what (and, perhaps, why) happened:

I had made liquid soap using my homemade bar soap (coconut oil only, for it's high cleansing and low suds). I used one bar and the trimmings from my other bars. A recipe I found said to use a 9:1 ratio of water:soap. So I weighed the soap, multiplied by nine, added that amount of distilled water to the pot, warmed, dissolved my soap, let it cool a bit, separated into two (one half is for an experiment I'm doing in making my own dishwasher soap), added 1 tbs of glycerin to the hand soap half, and waited. It was horrible. After 2 days it still looked and smelled like I had put soap water in a pot to soak it for cleaning. My beautiful, white, bar of coconut soap was reduced to a gray slimy water. Back to the internet, and I found your post.

Like I said, the whisking didn't help, but when I started added the saturated salt water, I noticed white precipitates forming. (sorry, I was a chemistry major. Precipitates= the solids that form and drop from a liquid substrate in a chemical reaction. Much the same way snow and rain precipitates from cloud vapor.) At first it looked like oatmeal, so I got out the electric beaters. Now I have 2 pots of beautiful WHITE soap that I beat up into a stiff "marangue."
I'm going to let it set and calm down for a bit and see what happens. I want liquid soap, not whipped soap.

I used the hand soap right away. My hands got fabulously cleaned, but I think I will add a bit more glycerin and essential oils. My coconut soap, unfortunately, does not smell like coconuts and it is made for cleaning, not conditioning.

But here is why I think that my soap didn't set up in the first place. I used distilled water. Harkening back to my days in the chem lab, I remembered that distilled water is different than filtered water and exponentially different than tap water. It is completely clean, stripped of anything that is not H2O. This makes it highly polarized, which makes it behave differently, chemically speaking. It is also why you should NEVER drink distilled water. It acts like a magnet for all your electrolytes, sucks them from your body, and eliminates them with your waste. You can actually get pretty sick if you drink too much.
So... by adding the salt, I've come to realize, it effectively "neutralized" the polarity of the water and allowed it to thicken. Next time, I think I will add some salt to my clean, distilled water. Hopefully this will allow me to skip a step.

That's just my two and a half cents. Sorry for the long post, hopefully it will help someone in the future. Remember, we may be wanting to get away from all the chemicals, but chemistry is constantly happening in nature. ;-)

Robert link

2/3/2015 01:20:25 am

By "dishwashER soap", did you mean for a machine? I wouldn't advise even trying that. Dishwashing machines work nothing like the way you'd wash dishes by hand. They squirt hard blasts of water thru a lot of empty space, and any tendency of a detergent to suds up in it will be brought out, to the detriment of...everything. Machine dishwashing detergents even commonly incorporate anti-foams to counteract the effect of soaps which may be created by the alkali in the detergents saponifying fats on the items being washed.

Also, let's not exaggerate the effects of either distilled or deionized water. Although it my not be the most healthful to drink, the difference in mineral content between it and regular faucet water isn't going to deprive you of that much in the way of minerals. The difference in salts between one water supply & another is far greater than that between some of them & distilled. Although you could make yourself sick by drinking "too much" distilled water, the same amount of ANY potable water would make you sick if you drank it. The amount of minerals regular water would replace would be trivial.

The sodium you added didn't neutralize anything peculiar to distilled water. It's just that sodium soap has much lower solubility than potassium soap, so you can usually adjust the viscosity of a liquid soap by adjusting the amount of potassium soap in it that's in solution vs. the amount of sodium soap that's in suspension. Once you find the ratio you like, instead of adjusting potassium soap solution with sodium chloride, you can saponify with that mole ratio of KOH & NaOH. You measure the moles of NaCl you added to get moles of NaOH, then take the total moles of soap (calculated by saponification no.) and subtract that from the Na to get the KOH you'd need. The additional moles of K+ that were in the original NaCl-thickened solution do approximately nothing (yeah, they have a LITTLE effect, but swamped by that of the Na+) to the viscosity, so don't worry about them in the calculation. You can even superfat a little, which is impracticable with clear soap solutions but is practicable with a gel of mixed K-Na soap.

Tammy

2/19/2015 02:41:27 pm

Im looking for an easy recipe for goats milk shampoo that doesn't have to be refridgerated that's really simple to make haven't had any luck so far but can you use melt and pour goats milk soap base to make this is it possible? also I would like to use essential oil and sweet almond oil any ideas? Thank you

Robert link

2/20/2015 01:24:29 am

Because you posted this in a thread on liquid soap, I assume you're interested in a liquid product, but the simplest way otherwise to do what you want would be to make a solid. There are a lot of people making solid goat milk soaps, and there are also some other surfactants which can be formulated into solids if you don't want to limit your formula to soap.

It's always possible to preserve water-based liquids, but in those that contain a considerable amount of foody stuff like milk, it can take a lot of preservative to discourage microbes. An example would be liqueurs like Bailey's Irish Cream, which is stable at room temperature because of its being 17% alcohol. I don't know how much lower that could go before it would start to spoil.

Kerrie

6/2/2015 04:40:27 am

Can powdered goat milk be added and not refridgerated?

Robert link

6/2/2015 04:56:15 am

Not for long once it's wet, with ordinary handling. You could sterilize it & pack it aseptically as in home canning.

Debbie

7/27/2015 03:59:20 am

I grated the soap & mixed it in with the hot water. We are now closing in intensity or so hours & I see it pedaling in color. Problem is; I just realized I forgot the glycerine. Also I used one 5oz bar of Burts Bees soap to 2 quarts of water. What do you suggest I do at this point. It is a bit frothy.

Julieanne link

7/29/2015 02:16:40 pm

Debbie, you could just try to use it as is, or add glycerine now and see how it does. Sometimes, depending on the weather and humidity, your results will vary. So it's sometimes something you just need to play around with and see how it works for you.

ginger omg yoir a genius. i love my liquid soap ther than it was too thin. i read this article. who would think salt would make that big a difference. thank you

9/29/2015 01:40:40 pm

linda

10/26/2015 05:50:02 pm

your info on thickening up thin liquid soaps is really helpful. i'm making liquid dish soap with kirk's castile soap and have found a very small amount of salt (~1 1/2 t.) to thicken it right up--actually i got soap pudding--but am wondering if the salt would pit my silverware. i tried washing soda to thicken the dish soap but it doesn't seem to be working. i just have inexpensive silverware from Target but it is nice enough that i don't want to ruin it. do you have any idea? i know the package said not to use lemon dish soap on them. i have to check if they are stainless steel or silverplate or what. thanks!

Asif

8/8/2016 11:22:26 am

I did this everything went perfect.i transfer the liquid soap to a dispenser bottle and the rest i kept it at a 1.5L bottle.After three weeks of using the soap,the soap turned watery like when i keep pumping the dispenser i could not lather the soap at all,it was just all water then when I check the 1.5L bottle the soap seems fine can lather well and soapy.why is it after 3 weeks,the soap in my dispenser is very watery and in my 1.5L bottle is like a natural liquid soap??

Anita

11/3/2019 03:27:52 pm

I came across this recipe while trying to figure out how to thin my purchased liquid soap--Equate brand from Walmart. Long story short, I added two drops of green soap dye to nearly a quart of regular liquid soap. It not only thickened the soap, it changed the properties of it. I'm not a chemist, but I think I can describe it by saying I think I could hold a clump of it in my hand and probably juggle it. Even after trying to thin it with water, it still has that weird property of holding itself together. When I turn the container over, the soap takes several minutes to level itself. I put it in a regular built-in soap dispenser in my kitchen, and it won't come out when I pump (most of the time). I think I'll have to throw it out, but I don't know how to get it out of the full built-in dispenser. Is there another way to thin it? I'm thinking of experimenting with household alcohol, but that's just an uneducated guess. I'm hoping one of the chemists can help answer my question.

Hi! I'm Julieanne!
You'll find me in the kitchen
trying new Trim Healthy Mama recipes, loving God, and carrying out that love as I bless my husband and teen daughters.

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