Thread: Homemade Shaving Cream?

OK, so there's a veritable plethora of posts here discussing homemade shave soap, so that's not really a topic I'm going to delve into here. My question is for the other end of the good shave products spectrum, the cream.
Does anyone know how -- or if such is even possible -- one might make a homemade shaving cream along the lines of, say, a tub of Trufitt & Hill?
I am about to start my first soap from rendered bacon fat I've been collecting and it occurred to me I generally prefer either creams or super lathers more than just soap. Being in a DiY mode, I have tried to look up making your own shaving cream with no dice.
The best I've found has been variations on this recipe:
Homemade Shaving Cream – Silky and Natural DIY Shaving Cream
But that is not a shaving cream in the classical men's toiletries sense; it's just lotion. From the sound of its ingredients, it wouldn't even lather. The closest variation I've yet to hear that even MIGHT lather involved the above recipe with the addition of some baking soda but that seemed more like a recipe for a painful face than a good shaving lather.
Does anyone have any information about this sort of thing? Your help would be most appreciated!

Tom

I have recently made up a batch of shaving soap as a foray into this area of wetshaving. I have seen mentioned on soaping forums two different possible venues. One is the making of liquid soap. The other is kind of far out but I have heard of incorporating a lot of water with some kind of mechanical agitation after the soap process is complete.

I am personally looking at the liquid soap avenue for now. It is a few more steps after the hot process, but sounds reasonable so far. Just need to get a few books and do some reading.

BTW, I wan't sure about my soap recipe, but I am starting to prefer it over my TOBS.

You may find some useful information in the Information for Soap-Makers thread.

Soap-making Manual by E.G.Thomssen has a Shaving Cream section. The section starts towards the bottom of the page and the formulas are on the next,

I have only just started soaping, and have only done one batch of junk grease soap. It turned out well as a hand soap.

Jonathan

Originally Posted by Datsots

You may find some useful information in the Information for Soap-Makers thread.

Soap-making Manual by E.G.Thomssen has a Shaving Cream section. The section starts towards the bottom of the page and the formulas are on the next,

I have only just started soaping, and have only done one batch of junk grease soap. It turned out well as a hand soap.

Jonathan

Sooo... it looks like shaving cream is basically soap but made with potassium lye instead of sodium lye then with more fats (stearic acid) and possibly glycerine added?

I interperate the first recipe as:

Hot KOH process the Coconut, Glycerin, and Stearic Acid

Coconut 9.74%
Glycerin 28.46%
Stearic Acid 58.80%

Super fat: Steric Acid 3.00%
66% Watter to KOH

Store in air tight container.

Jonathan

After making up a few more batches of soap this last weekend I can state that using 100% KOH will not net you a "Cream" soap. However, it looks like it can get it closer to your goal. After obtaining a few more books and luring on a LOt of soap forums it appears there are a few moer steps to be done after making a pure KOH soap. Unfortunatley, it seems like this is a fairly new "discovery" for the DIY soapers and artisian soapers and people are not sharing a lot of info. Some of the info I have picked up is:

1) The addition of soda ash. It's another alkali that needs to be nuetralized, but supposedly it makes the soap more malleable.
2) Making it a "liquid" soap with an alcohol or glycerin process and then "super creaming" with more stearic acid.
3) Addition of water and oils and some kind of mechanical agitation. Industrial milling or mortar and pestle.

I do not know how these would work, if they work together, in sequence or if you need to sacrafice a chicken on a blue moon to the lather gods..... but it's start.

PS: The 100% KOH ended up being a very soap, almost gummy soap. Molds easily, loads into a brush easily. Results will vary depending on oil/fats used to soap with.

Made a mistake for item #1 there. Meant to say Potassium Carbonate, commonly referred to as Pearl Ash.