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Previous Next The best candle and soap tips online! TECHNICAL TREATISE OM SOAP AND CANDLES. HISTORY OF THE SOAP AND ALKAU TKAI>*:S, 25 The importation of palm and cocoa-nut oils added an important variety to the list of soaps, particularly of toilet-soaps, the former beir.g a useful and pleasant material, improving all soaps into which it enters, which cannot, however, be enid of coeoa-nut oil, as it retains a rancid odor which it seems impossible to remove, anil which is to most people objectionable, so that it should be used with caution. On the other hand, it has many good qualities, making soap handsome in appearance and in use giving a copious lather. It has also properties peculiar to itself; thus it saponifies only in strong lyes, and will dissolve in salt water and is often called marine soap. It will also retain a large percentage of water -without impairing its solidity or appearance. These properties it in sonic degree imparts to other soaps to which it may be ad France, and made goods that rivalled those of the older manufacturers, beeidea numerous and superior toilet-soaps as well as family and industrial soaps. The former were better than the world had ever known; aad this superiority has been maintained against all competition. So we reach our own times and find large soap, candle, and alkali works in nearly all countries, whose products are consumed in vast quantities, and are a staple of commerce of the first importance, requiring large capital, employing many hands, and giving wealth to the nations. Although many of these productions are still of inferior quality, the arts are of the most progressive character, and there is a steady improvement accompanied by a constant effort towards superiority—? healthy elements which ere long must lead almost to perfection. We must now leave this fascinating subject with a notice of some natural products that are used as substitutes for soap, though they have not yet been found of importance enough to supplant it in utility—such as the berries of the soap-tree (Sapindus saponaria) of South America and the West Indies; aquilla bark (Quillaza saponaria) used for washing ailk and woollens; the juice of the aoapvvort (Saponaria officinalis) or "bouncing-bet," all of which form a lather with water. In California the Phalangium pomari-dianum is used as a substitute for soap and has its odor; there are also many natural earths and clays that have an alkaline reaction and can be used as substitutes for aoaps, though with caution as they usually contain other chemicals which might prove injurious to the skin or clothes. Many of these natural products have been utilized in pharmacy and the arts. 26 TECHNICAL TREATISE ON SOAP AND CANDLES. MATERIAL8.USED IN THE MANUFACTURE OP SOAPS. 27 SECTION III. MATERIALS USED IN THE MANUFACTURE OP SOAPS. ALKALIES. BESIDES the two irdispensable ingredients that constitute the materials of which all soap is made, viz., alkali and fats or oils, there are several others scarcely less important in the art, as lime, salt, watar, etc., all of which will be properly described. The two important alkalies potash and soda, which are the oxides of the metallic bases potassium and sodium, in the new chemical nomenclature are termed potassium hydrate aud sodium hydrate, meaning the caustic alkalies in solution, and are described by thf formulae NaHO caustic soda, KHO caustic potash. From these oxides the bases can be formed, which have for the chemist many peculiar and interesting properties, but for the soap maker are of but little interest, having no practical use in his art. But as regards the oxides or what we call potash and soda, lie cannot be too intimately acquainted with all their properties, in fact an accurate knowledge of them is necessary to facilitate his manufactures, for by this means he can intelligently acoouut for all success as well as all mistakes that may occur in his processes. "While each of the alkalies mentioned will form soaps, the soaps so formed will have different characters, though each may have equal detergent power in dissolving grease and dirt, yet they have different uses in the arts and for domestic purposes, and are quite different in their physical properties, the soaps from potash being soft, those from Boda hard. This property is often utilized to modify the quality of soaps, to make one harder or the other softer. The other ingredients of soap, namely the fatty acids, have many and distinct properties, the study of which is scarcely less important than that of the bases or alkalies, for as a fatty or sebacic acid may be more or less solid, so will it impart this property to the soaps into which it enters; thus stearine or the bard principle of fats will form a much more solid soap than oleine or the liquid part. This rule may have some exceptions under certain conditions. In the working of these fatty acids, or their behavior when combined with the alkaline bases, they may each have some peculiarity either in saponification or in ths resulting soap, SD we see the importance of a close study of the characteristics of each. For those in common use we can take for our guide the experience of others, but there are constantly arising new oils, greases, candleshop.com/cgi-bin/affiliates/clickthru.cgi?id=soforreal">waxes, etc., with whose properties ?we must experiment to discover their peculiarities aad their usefulness in forming soaps. We shall describe in the proper places the secondary substances indispensable in this manufacture, giving their properties and mode of use, but it will be unnecessary to detail all their chemical properties, as such descriptions would take unnecessary space, so we will confine ourselves to the properties they possess when applied to the arts of making soap and candles. Yet if the soap maker has the inclination and the time to study all the chemical properties of materials he may use, in fact to study chemistry generally, it would be of great advantage and add much interest to his work and no doubt result in a great improvement to his wares. With these few preliminary remarks we will proceed to the description of all known ingredients and niateriab in use for making soap. POTASH. Potasse, Fr. Kali, Ger. Potash was at first called fixed vegetable alkali, because it is generally obtained from the ashes of many plants. It is known iii the market by different names, derived from the 28 Previous Next
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