{"id":25160,"date":"2017-01-18T12:51:29","date_gmt":"2017-01-18T18:51:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lovinsoap.com\/?p=25160"},"modified":"2021-12-21T21:57:45","modified_gmt":"2021-12-22T03:57:45","slug":"white-spots-in-soap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lovinsoap.com\/2017\/01\/white-spots-in-soap\/","title":{"rendered":"What Are The White Spots In My Soap?"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the topics that I see posted about in our Facebook Group Saponification Nation<\/a> is people asking about white spots in their soap. This can be caused by a few different reasons. Let’s explore!<\/p>\n

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Stearic Spots<\/h1>\n

So I recently made a soap in Saponification Nation to show people how to do this beautiful drop swirl design<\/a>. Upon cutting…I saw them! Cue horror music. Stearic spots! I immediately knew why. I had my lye solution in the fridge to get ready for the Facebook Live and left it in a little too long. When I took it out, it was 60 degrees F. A bit too cold to soap with. My oils were about 80 degrees F.<\/p>\n

The combination of the lye solution and base oil low temperatures created the perfect environment for stearic spots to form.<\/p>\n

Just a side note. In the soaping community we call them stearic spots but really they can also be palmitic acid spots or actually a combo of both. Both are high melt-point oils. Palmitic acid melts at 145.2\u00a0\u00b0F and stearic acid melts at 156.7\u00a0\u00b0F. So for the purposes of this article, we’ll just call the issue stearic spots. When you look at the fatty acid profile for certain oils, they can contain stearic + palmitic acid. So for example, palm oil 44% palmitic acid and 5% stearic acid (on average). Shea butter is 5% palmitic acid and 40% stearic acid (on average).\u00a0 Most of your solid oils and butters are going to contain higher amounts of stearic and\/or palmitic acid.<\/p>\n

So if stearic acid has a melt point of 156 \u00b0F, do you have to mix your soap at that temp? Heavens no. Since you’re using a blend of oils, it drops the melt point of the total mixture so that you can mix at lower temps.<\/p>\n

The high melt point is the issue. If you mix with your ingredients at too low of temperatures, the stearic\/palmitic acid will start solidifying just a bit. Not only can you get the stearic spots, but you can get false trace. False trace is when the mixture starts to solidify, looking like trace; but it is actually the high melt point oils starting to solidify.<\/p>\n

I mixed this batch at way to low of temperatures. My normal temperature range for swirling soap is 85-100 \u00b0F for both the oil mixture and lye solution. This helps to keep things moving nice and slow to give me time to color and swirl. But it isn’t cool enough to give me false trace or stearic spots.<\/p>\n

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Here is a closeup.<\/p>\n

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For more tips for swirling, check out our free guide, Cold Process Soap Swirling Tips<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Some tips for preventing stearic spots.<\/h2>\n