Comments on: A Conversation at Safeway Regarding Soap

By: It’s Global Handwashing Day! - Adam Engelhart

It’s Global Handwashing Day! - Adam Engelhart — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 20:23:02 +0000

[...] is unavailable in your locality, I have written a little monograph on the subject, which begins here. If you require information on manufacturing lye, check this out; if on the manufacture of oil, [...]

By: Adam Engelhart » Soap: Background

Adam Engelhart » Soap: Background — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 03:53:31 +0000

[...] Prior: A Conversation at Safeway Regarding Soap. Next time: olive oil, coconut oil, and a mixture. Send this article to:These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]

By: Adam Engelhart » Various Technical Changes

Adam Engelhart » Various Technical Changes — Wed, 16 Aug 2006 22:23:02 +0000

[...] The width thing is the most important upgrade. When I made my first soap post, I noticed the image extended into the sidebar and looked pretty nasty, so I wanted to fix that before I continued. [...]

By: tellumo

tellumo — Sun, 02 Jul 2006 00:11:02 +0000

Thanks! I will keep you posted.

I agree with your hypothesis; as I understand, olive and coconut oils are two of the most commonly used oils for soapmaking. They have interestingly complementary properties as well, so I might make some soap with both oils.

By: Katie

Katie — Sat, 01 Jul 2006 22:56:06 +0000

Soap! Please let me know how it goes! I’ve only made glycerin-type soap before, which isn’t from scratch as your soaps will be. May I hypothesize that the coconut oil and olive oil soaps will be the best? (and I’m only partially basing that on what sounds yummiest to eat)

Ohhhh…and I’m responding to your long-lost e-mail right now…

By: Lauren

Lauren — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 06:53:47 +0000

Ah, I didn’t see the 100% lye part. Thanks to you I am also a MOTD fan, so let me know how your experiment goes!

By: MoTD

MoTD — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 01:10:14 +0000

Never before have cartoon bunnies so succinctly been used to explain the concept of stoichiometry.

By: tellumo

tellumo — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 22:17:29 +0000

I'm afraid it does! Making soap, at the most simple level, is adding a base to a fat. You can use any base, but sodium hydroxide (for solid soap) and potassium hydroxide (for liquid soap) are the traditional choices; I understand that they're also the most effectve ones. Confusingly, both of them are often called simply "lye." I'm using NaOH, which I had to get at the hardware store. Most drain openers contain one or the other alkali-metal hydroxide, along with a bunch of other junk, but the stuff I have is just lye. MOTD describes the process in a little more detail, and this site does so with a cute story involving bunnies, wolves, border collies, and sheep.

By: Lauren

Lauren — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 21:37:59 +0000

Selection looks fine to me…except what’s with the Draino?? Tell me that doesn’t go into the soap!