shampoo....

[kinglake]

hiyas has anyone got a nice recipe for shampoo? thanx xx jo xx

 

[YellowMickeyPonchos]

I have a good one for a solid shampoo bar. Just pulled it off the shelf yesterday, as it finally finished curing.

I do cold process soaps - are you looking for one based on liquid soap? Do you already make your own or are you looking for a good base to use and create your own?

 

[worm761]

i would love a shampoo recipe. Liquid would probably be best but whatever you have is fine. a good base recipe and then maybe some variations?....By any chance do you know how to make shower gel too? I cannot use anything involving lye due to an allergy. Thanks so much!

 

[YellowMickeyPonchos]

i would love a shampoo recipe. Liquid would probably be best but whatever you have is fine. a good base recipe and then maybe some variations?....By any chance do you know how to make shower gel too? I cannot use anything involving lye due to an allergy. Thanks so much!

First I need to ask you more about you. - Can you use a regular bar soap or any type of shower gel at all? Are there certain types that are better for you than others? Do liquid soaps work and bar soaps cause the reaction? Are handmade bar soap products less harsh for you?

The reason I have to ask that is due to a very common misconception. That misconception is that you can buy soap with no lye in it. Be wary of stores like LUSH that will actually tell you that their soaps have no lye - it's not an accurate statement. They just don't understand how their product is made. None of them do. I've been one of "those customers" that check them.

Almost every single product that is used to clean the human body has to be made with a form of lye. The thing is - when it is blended with the oils, the chemical bonds change and rearrange and that is what makes it soap. Once that reaction happens, there is no such thing as lye anymore in that product. You have to have that acid/base reaction in order to make the salt that we call soap.

It becomes Sodium Palmate, Sodium Cocosuccinate, etc. For liquid soaps and gels, it is Potassium Palmate, etc. (Lye is sodium hydroxide and is used for hard soaps and Potash is potassium hydroxide and is used for liquids, as it never hardens in the reaction.)

Handmade products are better for you than soaps manufactured by large companies, due to the fact that they do not have the glycerin extracted from them. Larger companies extract glycerin and use it to enhance their other skin careproducts or sell it off to other companies. That's why many "corporate soaps" are so harsh.

Does that help?

 

[worm761]

I have a problem with most bar soaps. I can usually use the liquid soaps but some still give me a reaction. Nothing horrible, just an itchy rash. I cannot use dawn dish soap. I can use oil of olay body soap but that isn't actually soap either. right now I have a soft soap gel (mango..mmm) and it has not given me a reaction. I would love to be able to make something and change the smells as I want without having the fear of the rash like with store stuff. I do not use Bath and Body works. Does that help at all?

 

[YellowMickeyPonchos]

I have a problem with most bar soaps. I can usually use the liquid soaps but some still give me a reaction. Nothing horrible, just an itchy rash. I cannot use dawn dish soap. I can use oil of olay body soap but that isn't actually soap either. right now I have a soft soap gel (mango..mmm) and it has not given me a reaction. I would love to be able to make something and change the smells as I want without having the fear of the rash like with store stuff. I do not use Bath and Body works. Does that help at all?

Yep - it does a bunch. Looks quite possibly like you can do Potassium Hydroxide (KOH) products and definitely not the Sodium. Is that Mango one made by Alba? Let me know the brand and I can check out the ingredients at the store. That will give me even further ideas on how to proceed. The other ingredient people have trouble with is Sodium Laurel Sulfate (sp?).

Some of the soap supply companies do sell really good organic base products (the shower gel is already manufactured so you don't have to keep a stock of the raw chemicals on hand) that you can fragrance and put additives in. Depending on what we figure out, that might work for you or it might help to make your own and that way you can really control what's going on your body.

This is going to be a fun learning experience for both of us. I've been itching to buy some KOH for a while now and didn't have an excuse!