Thread: Alum block turned moisturiser into superglue!

So I did a little reading on this to figure out what alum was and found some info on the web that may help to explain what is going on here, at least I've developed a theory.

So alum is basically just a salt that has a bond with a bunch of water molecules, the block stuff is said to be either potassium aluminum sulfate or ammonium aluminum sulfate. It's generally in the form of a hydrate (bonded with water). Without the water it's just a white powder (the salt) .. so my guess is what is happening is somehow the moisturizer is reacting with the alum to de-hyrdate it and leave the salt behind. I'm sure it could be reduced to the salt again by other means also, like heating would probably boil off the water.

http://science.jrank.org/pages/5422/...m-Sulfate.html

Edit: Oops realized problem was the glue thing ... maybe the salt reacting with something in the moisturizer or the salt maybe just being sticky when partially dehydrated