Sodium hydroxide is an alkali (base) and the acids are the fatty acids that make up the triglycerides present in oils and butters. While lye is dangerous to handle in its chemical form, the substance is not considered as an active ingredient in soaps. We at MSC decided to include sodium hydroxide in our ingredients list because you deserve to know how your soap was made. Chlorine bleach is produced by combining chlorine and sodium hydroxide. It is true that the words "lye" or "sodium hydroxide" do not appear on the Dove ingredient label. Sodium hydroxide isn’t necessarily bad, it depends on how it’s used. As long as the other ingredients are natural, the … Sodium Hydroxide has historically been used to hydrolyze fats and form soaps. Lye, sodium hydroxide, is a necessary component of soap making. Let's learn what it. When it is used to make soap, it chemically reacts with the fats until the fats are fully saponified. Any skin or hair cleansing product made without sodium hydroxide is not soap, it is detergent. When in doubt, Google is your best friend. Lye may also be used in the preparation of olives and pickles. We use a lot of extra fats (oils or butters) when formulating a soap recipe. It is also called caustic soda, soda lye or sodium hydrate. Lye soap has many medicinal uses. Any skin or hair cleansing product made without sodium hydroxide is not soap, it is detergent. If the soap is made properly, the lye is used up in the saponification process to turn oil into soap. The secret to great pretzels is often a lye bath! Lye, or sodium hydroxide, is a very caustic chemical capable of causing serious damage. We encourage you to do thorough research on the proper handling of lye and the safety measures pertinent to soap making. Drain cleaners contain sodium hydroxide, but they are not suitable for soaping because they contain other ingredients. The answer is -- of course. Lye for soap making is easier to get in a small amount, and they are usually sold in the form of flakes. The mineral form of Calcium Hydroxide is called portlandite. Black Friday Sale is Now Live - 10% OFF Everything - 15% OFF GIFT SETS! Superfatted soaps have superior moisturizing and emollient qualities. ), If you dig deep back to your high school chemistry days, you may remember learning about acid-base reactions. Handmade soap bars and some Commercial "soap" bars are made with lye even though the words "sodium hydroxide" or "lye" do not appear on the labels. Who is it for? Or, as UCLA Illustrated Glossary of Organic Chemistry puts it, "The process in which a triacylglyceride is reacted with aqueous hydroxide ion to form a mixture of glycerol and fatty acid salts (soaps). The severity of effects caused by Sodium Hydroxide is a function of the concentration, the pH, the length of tissue contact time and local conditions and skin type. For this obvious and legal reasons, we cannot guide you through the soap making process. We recommend making soaps in small batches so you can control and test your batches for quality, especially when the process is completed mostly by hand and hand tools. Use restrictions (high), Non-reproductive organ system toxicity (moderate), and Irritation (skin, eyes, or lungs) (low) denaturant, ph adjuster, and buffering. The reaction mechanism follows the nucleophilic carbonyl substitution pathway.". Read more about "Aren't all handmade soaps the same?". Does your bar of "soap" contain ingredients such as... We once had a customer who returned a bar of our natural Olive (Castile) & Shea soap because her dermatologist told her that she should not use a soap made with lye. Magnesium Hydroxide is also know as milk of magnesia. But even natural soapmakers know that consumers are afraid of the word "lye.". A basic soap recipe just needs a few essential ingredients: Water (distilled or spring), vegetable fat, essential oils for fragrance, and lye (sodium hydroxide) of course. Saponification of glycerol tristearate (a triacylglyceride) with NaOH (lye) yields a soap consisting of one part glycerol (shown in red) and three parts sodium stearate (shown in blue). ... and thought it was safe to mold the soap without goggles because it is hot process and it is fully cooked. Always check the ingredients thoroughly, and make sure the ingredients are sodium hydroxide only. As long as the other ingredients are natural, the soap will stay natural during the soap making process because lye is not present in the final product. Also, regular use has seen reduction in psoriasis, eczema, dry itchy skin, athlete’s foot, and other skin conditions. All skin types except those that have an identified allergy to it. Therefore, there is no lye (sodium hydroxide) present in the finished bars of soap. The chemical reaction of making soap, called saponification, is complete, the lye and oil molecules have combined and chemically changed into soap and glycerin. Any spills on your skin and eyes should be flushed with water for 30 minutes. While all real soap must be made with lye, no lye remains in our finished product after saponification (described below). Toxicity depends on the concentration of the solution and the duration of its contact with tissue. It can burn skin, cause blindness, and even cause death if ingested. Lye is neutralized in the process of saponification, the conversion of fat or oil into soap when combined together. This may also be true for lye at hardware stores. Superfatting is the process of adding extra fats (oils or butters) when formulating a soap recipe, so there is more fat in the mixture than the lye can react with during the chemical reaction. It has been known to make the skin appear young and fresh. Sodium Hydroxide . Simple Soap Can Help Decrease The Spread of Viruses. The short answer is yes, the soap is still natural. These alternative words are not always used to deceive consumers! Lye has many uses in the food industry. If there isn’t ebough fat, there will some left over sodium hydroxide in the soap, which may cause skin burns. To this day, the origins of Aleppo soap remain unclear. No lye -- No soap! EWG’s Skin Deep rates thousands of personal care product ingredients, culled from ingredient labels on products, based on hazard information pulled from the scientific literature and industry, academic and regulatory databases. It can burn holes in clothes and leave burn marks on skin.If you take care . As a consumer, you will never come in contact with it unless you buy the lye solution for your own product manufacturing process. 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