Obtaining lye has become one of the biggest challenges for home soap makers - and that's just here in the United States because of the use of lye in making illegal drugs. In other countries, it's difficult too. One reader from Malaysia said that he can't get lye without a poision permit - but CAN get a 50% lye/water solution. Can he use it? You bet!
Difficulty: Easy
Time Required: no extra time - just an adjustment to your procedures
Here's How:
- VERY IMPORTANT!
Make sure that your lye solution is just sodium hydroxide and water and not a liquid drain cleaner with other ingredients! - Make sure that you know what the ratio of lye to water is. It should be stated clearly - for example, a 50% lye solution would indicate it's 50% water and 50% lye - by weight.
- Now, once you've established that, there are two ways to go about it:
- Use the ready-to-go lye calculator at Majestic Mountain Sage. It allows you to calculate for either dry OR liquid lye!
- Figure it out mathematically - which is a good thing to understand, even if you ARE using the lye calculator.
- Now, the math of it:
NOTE: This is based on using a 50% lye solution. If you're solution is different, you'll need to adjust.
To adjust for YOUR recipe, you'll need to start with the amount of lye called for in your recipe and figure out how much solution that will take. In a 50% solution, it's easy to figure out - just double the weight of the lye and that will give you how much solution you need. Make sure you are weighing the solution, not using liquid measure! - So, if your recipe calls for 5 ounces of lye and 10 ounces of water, you would measure out 10 ounces of a 50:50 solution. (10 ounces of 50:50 solution would consist of 5 ounces of lye and 5 ounces of water.)
- Then, once you've got the lye properly measured/accounted for, you need to bring the amount of water up to the total called for in your recipe. With our 5 oz./10 oz. example, you just add an extra 5 oz. of water to the 50:50 solution. So, instead of 5 oz. of lye and 10 oz. of water using dry lye, you would have 10 ounces of 50:50 solution and 5 oz. of water. But...since the 50:50 solution actually contains 5 oz. of lye and 5 oz. of water - it's all the same!
- That's it - use the diluted lye solution as you would a freshly made pitcher of lye-water to make your soap.
Tips:
- Do NOT heat the lye liquid! I know, I know, the instructions all say to have your lye-water at about 100 degrees. However, the temperature of your lye solution is not as important as the temperature of your oils - and certainly not worth the risk of trying to heat lye-water!! If your room temperature is cold, you can use hot (NOT boiling) water as your "added water" to help bring the temperature up a bit. As long as your solution is somewhere between 80-100 degrees, you should be fine.
- Lye-water solution looks just like water and can cause serious burns even more quickly than dry lye! You have to be doubly even triply careful with it!! Store it away safely - as safely as you would any other dangerous chemical like acid or gasoline.
- Though I've repeated it above, be sure to weigh everything! Do not use liquid measures.
What You Need:
- Lye-water solution
- Basic oils and setup for making soap
