My wife and I have been making our own soap for a couple of years now. Nothing special. No special recipes. No special concoctions. My wife teaches chemistry and made some in one of her classes to demonstrate the saponification process. Being high school chemistry, everything had to be kept as simple as possible. She brought the excess home, and when I tried it, I was sold to say the least. I haven't "done the math" on the cost relative to over-the-counter soap because it doesn't matter much to me; I LIKE this stuff, and will use it almost regardless of cost. Here's the recipe:
1) Potassium Hydroxide (granules available on Ebay for pretty cheap),
2) Water (either well-water, rainwater, or distilled is best),
3) "Oil" (we use coconut oil which is why it may or may not be as cheap as over-the-counter stuff).
The ratios are: 1:2:7 in the order given for the ingredients. In other words; 1 part KOH, 2 parts water, 7 parts oil. This stuff is so 'lathery' that I have taken to using it instead of shaving cream. But that's not what this post/thread is about.
Given the success of this extraordinarily simple recipe and process, I have decided to go completely 'native' and make my own "lye" (the KOH), and use my own "oil" (rendered bear fat) ala early American pioneers. (Rendered bear fat was commonly used by the pioneers because of its "purity" AND it was more readily available than rendered beef fat.) I'll make the lye from wood-ash, a fairly straight-forward process. I've got about 3 gallons of rendered bear fat from some time ago, so that's not an issue. I had planned to use the bear grease, in a 1:1 ratio with bee's wax, for cast bullet lube, but since I have developed a fairly intense dislike for cast bullets, I certainly won't be using 3 gallons of it. And given my experiences with cast bullets, soap should be a much better use of the bear fat.
I'll take pictures of the lye-making process and the soap making too, but it's likely to be a little like watching paint dry.
News at eleven.
Paul
Soap
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