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Hey all, I've just picked up some cheap-as-chips Pyrex bowls with lids to melt some glycerin-based soaps into (TGQ & Ogallala samples), and was hoping someone could give me a quick run-down on the double-boiler method - last time I melted soap I used a microwave, which destroyed the scent completely - I love the scent of these samples so don't want to stuff them up.
Cheers,
Tom
bring water to boil, add a second vessel in it and the soap in the second vessel.
From my understanding, you need to put them in a pot or such, with a bit of water (inch or so, so the bottom of the bowl is submerged) then bring the water to a boil gently with the soap in it, this will cause to the soap to eventually melt into the form of the glass, careful not to get water in the soap...good luck.
Heres what I do : Get two pots 1 that will fit on top of the other one , fill the bottom one with an inch of water and let it come to a rolling simmer(almost boiling) , the point is , to let the steam that is trapped in between the two pots melt the soap, also a tip I learned is two melt it 95 percent take it off the boiler completely and let the residual heat finish the process. hope this helps:)
What you have to watch with the microwave method is to use minimal heat and as soon as it starts to melt get it out of there and stir it until it melts completely.
Yes with the double boiler its the steam in the lower part that does the job without scalding.
Couple of tricks here
You really don't have to melt the soaps completely in fact if possible you don't want to... Just melt them enough to form to the glass bowls.. This also keeps the suspended ingredients in suspension as the maker intended.. (you don't want all the clay at the bottom)
The glycerin soaps melt at about 160 F way lower than the boiling point of water, a simmer is the correct term you don't want a hard boiling pot and water splashing into the soap.... Steam is really the best but not always possible...
Quote:
Originally Posted by thebigspendur
Agreed, You mentioned Ogalla. I recently bought a puck from Barclay Crocker, I believe, and it has a sticker on the box that say's, if it doesn't fit in your mug/scuttle, You can melt it in the microwave. What you need to do, is reduce the power of your microwave, Knock it down to 50% and watch it. I've done this before with no problems. Even with Colleen's soap. I melted 5 sample pucks into one huge multi fragrance puck. it worked great....
Remember, Low Power, and watch it....
When I did mine I placed the bowl with the soap in it into the small pan with only a little bit of water in. Then turned the stove on until it just started to melt the soap, turned off the water and took the soap bowl out, worked great.
Thanks to all who posted - I thought it was something like what has been posted, but wanted to check before I buggered up some nice soaps. Because I don't have a proper doubleboiler or two pots or pans that'll fit nicely in each other, what I'm going to do is put the wee soap dishes in a pot or pan and bring water to a simmer around them. The dishes are made of Pyrex (or rather a cheap Mexican knock-off of Pyrex - Pyr-o-rey) so can handle the direct heat, and they all have snap-on plastic lids so I don't have to worry about water getting in them. Will let y'all know how it goes.
Just finished my melting, and I now have 9 snazzy little glass dishes with red plastic snap on lids with soap in the bottom. I only had samples to melt into them, so I've got 7 with TGQ samples and 2 with Ogallala soap samples. The TGQ samples were easy, as the bowl is almost the perfect size for them to begin with. All it took was a minute in the hot water bath to melt down the edges of the pucks and it slipped down into the bottom of the bowl into place. I put my first TGQ sample in for too long, so it was almost completely melted, then had a brainwave and put it in the fridge - I figure the fridge will cool and solidify the soap faster, resulting in less time for the clay to settle out of liquid suspension. I've put all my samples in the fridge to try and prevent settling, and I'm confident it'll work.
The OBR samples were harder, being much larger and flatter. I broke one into 8 pieces and melted that in the pan of water - it took forever and the lumps refused to melt, so for the 2nd sample, I broke it into 3 pieces then put it in the microwave (1100W) for 10s at 50% power - voila, perfectly melted soap. I'm hoping that it'll still be fine, since OBR themselves say it's fine to melt in the microwave, and the minimal time in the microwave will hopefully have prevented too much denaturation of the oils etc. Will update this post with pics tomorrow to show the finished product.
There is no such thing as a glycerine based soap. Soap is not made from glycerine, it is made from fats and lye. Some glycerine is produced in this process, and additional glycerine can be added through reprocessing.Quote:
Originally Posted by mosley59
Basically, a double boiler is a device that uses a boiling water bath to indirectly heat the contents of a container submerged in the bath. There are purpose built double boilers used for cooking, or you can make your own with an appropriate collection of pots and pans.
To melt (reprocess) soap, you need to grate the soap into the container that will be submerged in the boiling water bath, add a small amount of water, place the container in the water bath (the boiling water should not overflow into the container) and heat. Once the soap melts (be sure to stir the melt to mix well). Pore into containers and let it set. High glycerine content soaps will usually melt quite easily, and since they have probably been reprocessed at least once (to add the extra glycerine), you probably do not need to add much water to the mix. You will need to experiment a little to get the right proportions to give you the results you want.