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Home > THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A SOAP...
Previous Next The best candle and soap tips online! THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A SOAP FACTORY. Fig. 51. Strunz's Crutching Machine (working part of machine). Tlie Jacket Crutching Machine (Fig. 52).—The jacket on this machine is a circulating one, and is said to have no equal in its rapid heating or cooling power. There is no dead point in the jacket as in other jackets where the warm water remains for a long time outside of the current. The drawing shows two pipes on one side; one is to be connected with steam and the other with water. The escape should be left always free, and no cock or valve should be on the escape pipe. The little cock on the bottom is to let the water out of the jacket to prevent it from freezing, or else the jacket would burst. The steam should never be let on unless the jacket is free from water, otherwise it may strain the machine. These crutching machines are very useful for mixing the colors and perfumes of toilet soaps. We have now left little to add to the needed implements except the mi nor ones, as hand sti rrers, or paddles and crutches, which are too well known to need description, scales, weights, shovels, and spades for cutting out tallow, etc. 246 TECHNICAL TREATISE ON SOAP AND CANDLES. THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A SOAP FACTORY. 247 Almost all soaps are now stamped, and many wrapped; for stamping there are numerous presses in use, the most important have a full description in our chapter on toilet soaps. dipping out the hot paste from the kettles, and copper buckets (Fig. 55) for conveying it to the frames. Fig. 54. Fig. 55. Pig. 52. Copper dippers, with handles of two or more feet in length, Fig. 56, are used for dipping the soap into frames and for many other purposes. Fig. 56. Strunz's Jacket Crutching Machine. Minor Implements.—The minor implements of the soap laboratory are, a crutch, Fig. 53, composed of a long wooden Fig. 53. a handle adjusted at the end to a board, and used for stirring the soap paste in the operation of "mottling;" large, cullen-dered, iron ladles, with long, wooden handles (Fig. 54) for 248 TECHNICAL TREATISE ON SOAP AND CANDLES. THE FABRICATION OF SOAPS. 249 SECTION XI. THE FABRICATION OF SOAPS. Soaps by Boiling.—The suitable preparation of the lyes for the decomposition of the fatty bodies is beyolid doubt the most important process in the art of making soap, and it therefore requires the closest attention and study, for without the knowledge and experience this study gives, much loss of time and material may result. We here repeat that the alkalies of commerce are never pure, and in our previous sections we have described these impurities and the modes of analysis. We will now give instructions for the proper preparation of the lyes for use, with suitable tests for strength and purity. For ordinary purposes the caustic lyes of soda as now received are generally of sufficient purity when freshly prepared for making common soaps, though there are none of them that do not require an investigation before entire confidence can be given to them. With potash the soap-maker will find still more difficulty as it is usually still more impure, as has also been shown, though in making soft soap with the potash lyes the process is quite different from that in use for the hard soaps from soda lyes. Yet a pure and caustic alkali is essential to nearly all methods. Whether we need a potash or a soda lye it is necessary in almost all cases to render them caustic, that is, to remove their carbonic acid by means of lime, and this lime should be reliable and be tested to discover if it contains any impurities or at least such an excess of them as to make it unfit for use. These tests are also shown elsewhere. The action of the lime is to remove the carbonic acid, by the power it has of great affinity for that acid, causing a decomposition by absorbing it and forming an insoluble carbonate of lime which is precipitated, after giving a greater part of its oxide to the alkali. Of the quantity of hydrate of lime necessary to make caustic a given quantity of alkali, there is great diversity of opinion, yet there is a rule which must be studied, for an alkali may work wrong that has too little or too much lime, or, as is technically called, too low or too high in lime. Thus it is necessary to give due regard to the properties of lime and to its action in strong or weak lyes which is quite different, as lime will not act in strong solutions of alkali. We have heretofore given the proper instructions for the alkalimetric tests for these materials, and they should receive attention to aid the necessary calculations, yet we will give an example as a further guide. The carbonate of potash is a combination of 1 equivalent potash = 47.11, and 1 equivalent carbonic acid = 22, and its equivalent is therefore 69.11. If we desire to change this into caustic alkali, we must extract the carbonic acid. Tins is done by offering an equivalent of caustic lime, which, when changed into carbonate of lime, will absorb likewise 1 equivalent of carbonic acid. Since, however, the equivalent of the caustic lime is = 28, it follows that to 69.11 parts in weight of carbonate of potash 28 parts in weight of caustic lime must be applied, to make the former completely caustic. To 50 kilog. (110 lbs.) of pure carbonate of potash, therefore, 20.3 kilog. (44.66 lbs.) of caustic lime are added. We, however, have never to do with pure carbonates of the alkalies, nor with pure caustic lime, so that in practice other corresponding proportions are required than are just given by theoretical calculation. Supposing, for instance, the potash for preparing the caustic lye contains 72 per cent, of carbonate of potash and the lime contains 82 per cent, pure caustic lime, then we must in the same ratio, as the potash contains less than 100 per cent.,take less lime; while in the same proportion as the burned lime contained lesa caustic lime, apply more of the lime. In the suggested example the calculation would be rendered thus: X(that is the necessary quantity of lime) = ————- = 35.65 ; that is, we would apply 100 kilog. (220 lbs.) of a 72 per cent, potash ,- 250 Previous Next
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