I have some grand plans for xmas presents involving body butter, so a while ago I made a first attempt. I thought I'd go for a Body Shop-esque recipe, so I got out my mega-tub of mango body butter and copied down the ingredients.
water - okay, fine
mango butter
sweet almond oil
cocoa butter - oil phase should total about 25% for a body butter
glycerin
glyceryl stearate and PEG-100 stearate - this is the emulsifier, exact same ingredients are available as Lotion Pro 165 from Lotioncrafter or as Simulsol 165 from Windy Point, and probably elsewhere; usage rate is 1-5%
cyclomethicone - for glide!
phenoxyethanol - preservative
parfum - smellies, </= 1%
benzyl alcohol - preservative
methylparaben - preservative
propylparaben - preservative, these are generally at </=1.5% each
xanthan gum - thickener
disodium EDTA - chealator, 0.2%
sodium hydroxide - pH adjuster (if needed)
potassium hydroxide - pH adjuster (if needed)
citric acid - pH adjuster (if needed)
CI 75120 - colourant
I subbed in ingredients I had, using the recommended usage rates to figure out how much of each to put in. I ended up with a 25% oil phase, 15% hard oils and 10% liquid oils. I used Simulsol 165 as the emulsifier at 3.5%, added 3% cyclomethicome because I love 'cones, subbed preservatives for ones I have, left out the xanthan gum (perhaps foolishly), and left out the pH adjusters because I didn't need to adjust the pH. Scented with 1% banana coconut FO from Candora, and omg! I love this fragrance. It is what sunscreen would smell like in my ideal world.
It was a normal heat and hold process with oils and water done separately. Emulsification looked normal, but the lotion didn't thicken virtually at all as it cooled. Maybe leaving out the xanthan gum was a bad idea. It was so runny! It was also very oily when applied to my legs. I feel like the 10% liquid oil was too much by a lot. My legs are dry-ish and the oil didn't sink in for probably 8 or 12 hours.
Anyway, within 2 weeks the lotion had separated. I'm not really sure why, since the glyceryl stearate and PEG-100 stearate is supposed to be able to emulsify 20-30% oil at 2.5% usage, and I used 3.5% for 25% oils. Maybe it didn't like the preservatives or fragrance I used, or maybe it needed a thickener/stabilizer like xanthan gum. Who knows. All I know is I am addicted to that fragrance.
Friday, July 22, 2016
Tuesday, July 12, 2016
CE and ferulic serum
Hey look, I'm like officially a "natural beauty" blogger now that I have a DIY vitamin C serum post! Ew, I feel so dirty even typing that.
<misanthropic rant>For the love of dog, please do not follow the vast majority of DIY vitamin C serum recipes out there. I'm pretty sure this one (No! Adding vitamin E will NOT adjust the pH of your serum! It just makes my skin crawl... and the many others like it...) is why this "why not to DIY vitamin C serum" blog post also exists. The why-not-to article has salient points. Lots of them. And considering the intelligence of the average person, and the fact that a full 50% of all people are even stupider than that, probably most people shouldn't DIY a vitamin C serum... or anything else for that matter, except maybe feeding and dressing themselves... and we all know how well they do that...</misanthropic rant>
Here's a good DIY tutorial, for those of you who have at least half a brain, understand concepts like solubility, pH, the need for preservatives, and sanitary manufacturing processes. I used her simpler 8-ingredient recipe, due to not having much of the stuff needed for the complicated one.
I will admit I substituted tocopheryl acetate for tocopherol as the vitamin E because that is what I have. I know full well that tocopheryl acetate is not as good an antioxidant as tocopherol, but I also know that it is a good moisturizer, that the ferulic acid will help stabilize the vitamin C too, and that when the serum turns orange it is time to throw it out because it has oxidized and is no longer effective. I also substituted liquid Germall Plus for the Optiphen Holy Snails recommends (and adjusted the water accordingly), since my face doesn't like Optiphen.
The instructions for putting it all together are in Part 2 of the tutorial; there are links at the top of the post.
Anyway, I had to warm it a bit to get the polysorbate-80 to dissolve, in addition to warming the propylene glycol and ferulic acid to get the FA to dissolve. My pH tested at about 3.5, which is fine.
Frankly, I don't like how it came out. It is mad sticky. It also itches and tingles like crazy on my skin to the point where I had to wash it off. Bear in mind that I have quite sensitive skin, but geez, no one would want that sticky, shiny mess on their face. Maybe that is another reason not to DIY vitamin C serums. I may try this again with PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil as the solubilizer for the vitamin E in the hopes that it will be less sticky, and less L-ascorbic acid to hopefully rein in the itch-and-tingle, but we'll see.
<misanthropic rant>For the love of dog, please do not follow the vast majority of DIY vitamin C serum recipes out there. I'm pretty sure this one (No! Adding vitamin E will NOT adjust the pH of your serum! It just makes my skin crawl... and the many others like it...) is why this "why not to DIY vitamin C serum" blog post also exists. The why-not-to article has salient points. Lots of them. And considering the intelligence of the average person, and the fact that a full 50% of all people are even stupider than that, probably most people shouldn't DIY a vitamin C serum... or anything else for that matter, except maybe feeding and dressing themselves... and we all know how well they do that...</misanthropic rant>
Here's a good DIY tutorial, for those of you who have at least half a brain, understand concepts like solubility, pH, the need for preservatives, and sanitary manufacturing processes. I used her simpler 8-ingredient recipe, due to not having much of the stuff needed for the complicated one.
I will admit I substituted tocopheryl acetate for tocopherol as the vitamin E because that is what I have. I know full well that tocopheryl acetate is not as good an antioxidant as tocopherol, but I also know that it is a good moisturizer, that the ferulic acid will help stabilize the vitamin C too, and that when the serum turns orange it is time to throw it out because it has oxidized and is no longer effective. I also substituted liquid Germall Plus for the Optiphen Holy Snails recommends (and adjusted the water accordingly), since my face doesn't like Optiphen.
The instructions for putting it all together are in Part 2 of the tutorial; there are links at the top of the post.
Anyway, I had to warm it a bit to get the polysorbate-80 to dissolve, in addition to warming the propylene glycol and ferulic acid to get the FA to dissolve. My pH tested at about 3.5, which is fine.
Frankly, I don't like how it came out. It is mad sticky. It also itches and tingles like crazy on my skin to the point where I had to wash it off. Bear in mind that I have quite sensitive skin, but geez, no one would want that sticky, shiny mess on their face. Maybe that is another reason not to DIY vitamin C serums. I may try this again with PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil as the solubilizer for the vitamin E in the hopes that it will be less sticky, and less L-ascorbic acid to hopefully rein in the itch-and-tingle, but we'll see.
Micellar water: critical micellization concentration (CMC) of different surfactants
As I hinted in this post, there is a property that surfactants have called critical micellization concentration (CMC). I did a bit of research on it when I was trying to find out how much surfactant is used in a micellar cleansing water (which is obviously a different amount for different surfactants)... it can't be "micellar" water unless there are micelles! If you don't know what a micelle is, go spend a few minutes at the University of Google, and meet me back here.
So, to simplify, the CMC is the lowest concentration of a surfactant that will form micelles in water (or whatever diluent the researcher is determining/stating the CMC for... we are really only concerned about water), so it is the lowest concentration of surfactant you need to be able to call your solution a micellar water!
These values didn't end up being super helpful in determining proper surfactant concentrations for micellar cleanser, since they are so low as to likely be inadequate for cleansing purposes, but they are interesting nonetheless and, by definition, form the lower limit for surfactant concentrations in a micellar cleanser.
The ones I have collected are for surfactants I own; if you know others you'd like to submit to this list, please comment with the values! CMCs are listed in various units including ppm (parts per million), mol/L (moles per litre), and g/L (grams per litre). I am listing in grams per litre of water, since that is most useful in cosmetic chemistry formulating, but if you are a nerd like me you can sort out how to convert from mol/L to g/L (that's how I got the value for decyl glucoside).
CMCs of various surfactants
1.7 g/L caprylyl/capryl glucoside
0.7 g/L decyl glucoside
0.06 g/L (60 mg/L) polysorbate-20
1.1 g/L PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil
N.B. It is just my assumption, but I would think that the CMCs refer to concentrations of active chemicals in your surfactants, since they can come in different strengths. That is, you'd need 10 grams of a 10% active surfactant to get 1 gram of the actual surfactant ingredient into your formulation. The stuff as it comes out of the bottle is not 100% active; for example, the decyl glucoside I have is 51% active. Note that I write my formulas for "as it comes out of the bottle." So my decyl glucoside micellar water that was "1% decyl glucoside" actually only had 0.51% active decyl glucoside in it.
So, to simplify, the CMC is the lowest concentration of a surfactant that will form micelles in water (or whatever diluent the researcher is determining/stating the CMC for... we are really only concerned about water), so it is the lowest concentration of surfactant you need to be able to call your solution a micellar water!
These values didn't end up being super helpful in determining proper surfactant concentrations for micellar cleanser, since they are so low as to likely be inadequate for cleansing purposes, but they are interesting nonetheless and, by definition, form the lower limit for surfactant concentrations in a micellar cleanser.
The ones I have collected are for surfactants I own; if you know others you'd like to submit to this list, please comment with the values! CMCs are listed in various units including ppm (parts per million), mol/L (moles per litre), and g/L (grams per litre). I am listing in grams per litre of water, since that is most useful in cosmetic chemistry formulating, but if you are a nerd like me you can sort out how to convert from mol/L to g/L (that's how I got the value for decyl glucoside).
CMCs of various surfactants
1.7 g/L caprylyl/capryl glucoside
0.7 g/L decyl glucoside
0.06 g/L (60 mg/L) polysorbate-20
1.1 g/L PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil
N.B. It is just my assumption, but I would think that the CMCs refer to concentrations of active chemicals in your surfactants, since they can come in different strengths. That is, you'd need 10 grams of a 10% active surfactant to get 1 gram of the actual surfactant ingredient into your formulation. The stuff as it comes out of the bottle is not 100% active; for example, the decyl glucoside I have is 51% active. Note that I write my formulas for "as it comes out of the bottle." So my decyl glucoside micellar water that was "1% decyl glucoside" actually only had 0.51% active decyl glucoside in it.
PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil micellar water
I hadn't opened my container of PEG-40 hydrogenated castor oil (hereinafter referred to as PEG-40) yet, so I thought I'd give another micellar water a go using this as the surfactant. Given that I liked how my skin felt using the polysorbate-20 version (after rinsing off the nasty stinging Optiphen Plus), I was hopeful that I might like this one too; they are both non-foaming surfactants, usually used as solubilizers.
Following the formula of my last couple of batches, this one was just water, surfactant, and preservative. I switched out my 1% of Optiphen Plus and used 0.5% of liquid Germall Plus instead. This time I heated the water and PEG-40 together so the PEG-40 would melt; it's quite thick at room temperature. Once it cooled down, I added the preservative.
My opinion of this one is that it feels much nicer than the caprylyl/capryl glucoside and the decyl glucoside versions due to the lack of soapiness and not feeling crazy-dry after using it, and better than both of those and the polysorbate-20 version due to not having the Optiphen sting. I also think I like it better than my first Cromollient version because it's not as sticky, but I think that is the fault of the glycerin in that recipe.
My skin felt clean-ish and fresh after using this recipe. Bear in mind that I don't wear makeup, but I do use a prescription lotion and a sunscreen, as well as having really oily skin, which is what the cleanser was having to deal with after a full day at work. I don't know if I'll ever really be able to get behind a leave-on cleanser (I'm totally neurotic about rinsing toothpaste out of my mouth too), but it will be a convenient thing to have when camping or working outside in the summer, which is something I do fairly regularly.
Of all the recipes I've tried, this is my favourite so far, but I definitely want to give a fair chance to the Cromollient and polysorbate-20 by trying them in recipes without stuff that me and my skin don't like.
Following the formula of my last couple of batches, this one was just water, surfactant, and preservative. I switched out my 1% of Optiphen Plus and used 0.5% of liquid Germall Plus instead. This time I heated the water and PEG-40 together so the PEG-40 would melt; it's quite thick at room temperature. Once it cooled down, I added the preservative.
My opinion of this one is that it feels much nicer than the caprylyl/capryl glucoside and the decyl glucoside versions due to the lack of soapiness and not feeling crazy-dry after using it, and better than both of those and the polysorbate-20 version due to not having the Optiphen sting. I also think I like it better than my first Cromollient version because it's not as sticky, but I think that is the fault of the glycerin in that recipe.
My skin felt clean-ish and fresh after using this recipe. Bear in mind that I don't wear makeup, but I do use a prescription lotion and a sunscreen, as well as having really oily skin, which is what the cleanser was having to deal with after a full day at work. I don't know if I'll ever really be able to get behind a leave-on cleanser (I'm totally neurotic about rinsing toothpaste out of my mouth too), but it will be a convenient thing to have when camping or working outside in the summer, which is something I do fairly regularly.
Of all the recipes I've tried, this is my favourite so far, but I definitely want to give a fair chance to the Cromollient and polysorbate-20 by trying them in recipes without stuff that me and my skin don't like.
Polysorbate-20 micellar water
After the unwanted foaminess with the caprylyl/capryl glucoside and decyl glucoside attempts, I decided to change course and go for a definitely-non-foaming surfactant, polysorbate-20.
I followed the same strategy and processing as in the decyl glucoside formula, with just water, surfactant, and preservative, at the same percentages.
I couldn't believe it when this one stung too! Polysorbate-20 is recommended at up to 20% of a formula (and is mostly used for leave-on products)! That's when I figured out it wasn't likely the surfactants stinging... it was the Optiphen. Looks like my skin prefers parabens and formaldehyde donors... on my face, anyway. Oh well, I'm not afraid of well-tested ingredients. I also feel like powdered Germall Plus is on its way to becoming my favourite preservative anyway; it's so much cheaper and you use so little of it!
My skin felt good after using this formula (after rinsing it off to stop the Optiphen sting), not crunchy like with the last one. So, I'll be trying this one again some time with a different preservative.
I followed the same strategy and processing as in the decyl glucoside formula, with just water, surfactant, and preservative, at the same percentages.
I couldn't believe it when this one stung too! Polysorbate-20 is recommended at up to 20% of a formula (and is mostly used for leave-on products)! That's when I figured out it wasn't likely the surfactants stinging... it was the Optiphen. Looks like my skin prefers parabens and formaldehyde donors... on my face, anyway. Oh well, I'm not afraid of well-tested ingredients. I also feel like powdered Germall Plus is on its way to becoming my favourite preservative anyway; it's so much cheaper and you use so little of it!
My skin felt good after using this formula (after rinsing it off to stop the Optiphen sting), not crunchy like with the last one. So, I'll be trying this one again some time with a different preservative.
Decyl glucoside micellar water
I have learned to start simple now. At least after two semi-fails.
Next surfactant on the to-try list is decyl glucoside. After the stinging I experienced with the caprylyl/capryl glucoside recipe, I stripped this one down to three ingredients: water, surfactant, and preservative. Just distilled water, 1% decyl glucoside, and Optiphen Plus.
Boiled the water, added the surfactant, cooled, added preservative, and mixed.
It foamed and stung when I used it. Boo. I had to rinse my skin after applying this, and it felt stripped, as though I had used a strong-ish rinse-off cleanser. That decyl glucoside is powerful stuff.
At this point I still hadn't put two and two together regarding the Optiphen stinging, I was too taken aback by all the foam!
Next surfactant on the to-try list is decyl glucoside. After the stinging I experienced with the caprylyl/capryl glucoside recipe, I stripped this one down to three ingredients: water, surfactant, and preservative. Just distilled water, 1% decyl glucoside, and Optiphen Plus.
Boiled the water, added the surfactant, cooled, added preservative, and mixed.
It foamed and stung when I used it. Boo. I had to rinse my skin after applying this, and it felt stripped, as though I had used a strong-ish rinse-off cleanser. That decyl glucoside is powerful stuff.
At this point I still hadn't put two and two together regarding the Optiphen stinging, I was too taken aback by all the foam!
Caprylyl/capryl glucoside micellar water
Given that I have a camping trip coming up in a few weeks, and that I am neurotic about twice-daily face washing, I figured I should design myself some nice micellar cleansing water so that I only have to make the trek to the shower station once a day...
You might have already read about my previous micellar water experiment, but I felt like it was kinda sticky, probably from the few percent of glycerin I put in it, so I wanted to improve my recipe.
I also have several surfactants to try, so I think I will have a little series of micellar water posts. This one will be using caprylyl/capryl glucoside as the surfactant.
I still haven't learned to start simple, as you will see in this post.
Micellar water, as the name implies, is mostly water, with some surfactant added in at a sufficient concentration to form micelles. That "sufficient concentration" I refer to is different for each surfactant, and in chemistry is referred to as the critical micellization concentration, or the CMC. More on that in a later post. Micellar waters also contain things to make them nice for your skin, and also preservative(s) so they don't start looking like kombucha and/or give you a nasty infection.
The recipe I invented this time included water with 1% caprylyl/capryl glucoside and 1% or less of the following: hydrolyzed oats (general niceness), allantoin (occlusive), propylene glycol (dirt solvent/moisturizer), xylitol (for slip), lactic acid (exfoliation), and Optiphen Plus (preservative).
I pre-boiled the distilled water, and mixed everything together, and that was it.
It was waaay sudsier than I expected, including foaming up a bit on the cotton pad and on the skin when used. Perhaps my surfactant concentration is too high, as this is way too foamy and feels too much like a rinse-off cleanser.
Also it stings when I use it. Initially I thought that was from the lactic acid, but given that I can use 10% lactic acid gel with less stinging, I was suspicious. Upon further experimentation, I believe my face is sensitive to the Optiphen.
You might have already read about my previous micellar water experiment, but I felt like it was kinda sticky, probably from the few percent of glycerin I put in it, so I wanted to improve my recipe.
I also have several surfactants to try, so I think I will have a little series of micellar water posts. This one will be using caprylyl/capryl glucoside as the surfactant.
I still haven't learned to start simple, as you will see in this post.
Micellar water, as the name implies, is mostly water, with some surfactant added in at a sufficient concentration to form micelles. That "sufficient concentration" I refer to is different for each surfactant, and in chemistry is referred to as the critical micellization concentration, or the CMC. More on that in a later post. Micellar waters also contain things to make them nice for your skin, and also preservative(s) so they don't start looking like kombucha and/or give you a nasty infection.
The recipe I invented this time included water with 1% caprylyl/capryl glucoside and 1% or less of the following: hydrolyzed oats (general niceness), allantoin (occlusive), propylene glycol (dirt solvent/moisturizer), xylitol (for slip), lactic acid (exfoliation), and Optiphen Plus (preservative).
I pre-boiled the distilled water, and mixed everything together, and that was it.
It was waaay sudsier than I expected, including foaming up a bit on the cotton pad and on the skin when used. Perhaps my surfactant concentration is too high, as this is way too foamy and feels too much like a rinse-off cleanser.
Also it stings when I use it. Initially I thought that was from the lactic acid, but given that I can use 10% lactic acid gel with less stinging, I was suspicious. Upon further experimentation, I believe my face is sensitive to the Optiphen.
Sunday, July 10, 2016
surfactants in micellar water
Here's a link to an interesting article on surfactants, with a section on surfactants used in micellar cleansing waters. It gives some idea about types of surfactants used, and the usage rates.
Wednesday, July 6, 2016
Fangirl moment
OMG, Perry Romanowski, the most famous cosmetic chemist in the world according to Google, just answered my post on the forum of his Chemist's Corner website!!!!1111~
Hahhah, okay, I'm done with that nonsense now. ;)
Hahhah, okay, I'm done with that nonsense now. ;)
My version of "facial wash with a ton of extracts"
Hot on the heels of my conditioner success, I thought I'd go for a more-or-less guaranteed success: a surfactant product. I modified a version of Susan Barclay-Nichols' Facial Wash with a Ton of Extracts, from her Formulating Facial Products ebook, to suit me and to include some extracts I got in my most recent ingredients shipment (it arrived before the postal strike, woo!).
Frankly, Susan's version of this looks like a mix of blood and mud, but that is due to the extracts she chose to include, not due to the basic ingredients. My version contains the green tea and cucumber peel extracts, so it is yellow-y green. I also put in 2% salicylic acid, which seems to have precipitated after the mixture cooled, but is staying mostly dispersed, so I just shake it up before using.
I don't know if it is the undissolved SA (don't think so as I've made a 2% SA cleanser that had the same problem before), the cucumber peel extract (Susan says some people can be sensitive to it), or the surfactants I chose, but I find it a touch burn-y along the edges of my eyelids when I wash my face with it. I didn't make that much of it, so I'll just use it up. I'd like to come up with a SA recipe I really like, as I've been noticing more blackheads on my nose lately. Maybe because it's summer. 
Frankly, Susan's version of this looks like a mix of blood and mud, but that is due to the extracts she chose to include, not due to the basic ingredients. My version contains the green tea and cucumber peel extracts, so it is yellow-y green. I also put in 2% salicylic acid, which seems to have precipitated after the mixture cooled, but is staying mostly dispersed, so I just shake it up before using.
I don't know if it is the undissolved SA (don't think so as I've made a 2% SA cleanser that had the same problem before), the cucumber peel extract (Susan says some people can be sensitive to it), or the surfactants I chose, but I find it a touch burn-y along the edges of my eyelids when I wash my face with it. I didn't make that much of it, so I'll just use it up. I'd like to come up with a SA recipe I really like, as I've been noticing more blackheads on my nose lately. Maybe because it's summer.
SD conditioner try #7, lucky #7
For this attempt, I decided to strip it right down. After the 6th failure, I'd started asking the internet for help. My prior research had not turned up enough to let me succeed, so I came out of my introvert hamster ball for a few minutes to see if other humans could help me. One helpful individual suggested I leave out the preservatives until I have something stable. That was a good idea and I decided to leave out all the fancy things too. The same person mentioned pH, and that got me to thinking that I hadn't been calculating the neutralization ratio for the SD for each recipe (1 part citric acid to 5.88 parts SD, theoretically), rather I had been picking a recipe and modifying one ingredient at a time... which is a good approach if your foundation is solid, but otherwise potentially useless.
I also went back to putting the SD in the oil phase, because, if you recall, back in that first attempt I did get emulsification doing that, until I added the cool-down ingredients.
So my bare-bones recipe was as follows:
A
81.8 g water
0.6 g citric acid
B
6 g cetearyl alcohol
3 g stearamidopropyl dimethylamine
Heated and held. Mixed. Emulsification was very thin. I added an additional 0.4 g of citric acid after checking the pH (was about 5.5) to total 1% citric acid. It thickened! Really nicely!
Relishing my modicum of success, I left it for 24 hours, using it in the shower that evening. It felt fine, though of course I missed my 'cones. The next day, it was still together and still as thick as Greek yogurt so I decided to be reckless and add things to it. I had just received a shipment with some powdered Germall Plus in it, so I thought I'd try that, so in went 0.14 g. Everything looked fine. Added 1.5 g of liquid panthenol and stirred it up. It didn't thin! I'd gotten a new fragrance oil too that I was loving, so I put in 0.2 g of Crafter's Choice citrus and sage fragrance... that was all I needed! It's actually not an in-your-face fragrance, very soft and fresh at the same time, but you don't need much. It was fine! Aaaah! It is still fine 2 days later! So exciting!
Now all I have to do is get the silicones in there and I'll have what I want! I may have to do another batch for that, since I've read that the dimethicone should go in the heated oil phase and the cyclomethicone should go in immediately following emulsion.
YAY! 
I also went back to putting the SD in the oil phase, because, if you recall, back in that first attempt I did get emulsification doing that, until I added the cool-down ingredients.
So my bare-bones recipe was as follows:
A
81.8 g water
0.6 g citric acid
B
6 g cetearyl alcohol
3 g stearamidopropyl dimethylamine
Heated and held. Mixed. Emulsification was very thin. I added an additional 0.4 g of citric acid after checking the pH (was about 5.5) to total 1% citric acid. It thickened! Really nicely!
Relishing my modicum of success, I left it for 24 hours, using it in the shower that evening. It felt fine, though of course I missed my 'cones. The next day, it was still together and still as thick as Greek yogurt so I decided to be reckless and add things to it. I had just received a shipment with some powdered Germall Plus in it, so I thought I'd try that, so in went 0.14 g. Everything looked fine. Added 1.5 g of liquid panthenol and stirred it up. It didn't thin! I'd gotten a new fragrance oil too that I was loving, so I put in 0.2 g of Crafter's Choice citrus and sage fragrance... that was all I needed! It's actually not an in-your-face fragrance, very soft and fresh at the same time, but you don't need much. It was fine! Aaaah! It is still fine 2 days later! So exciting!
Now all I have to do is get the silicones in there and I'll have what I want! I may have to do another batch for that, since I've read that the dimethicone should go in the heated oil phase and the cyclomethicone should go in immediately following emulsion.
YAY!
SD conditioner trys #5 and #6
Fifth attempt included 4% SD and 0.2% citric acid and less silicones than the previous one. Suffice it to say there was once again separation. Arg.
Sixth attempt omitted cyclomethicone on the logic that "it's watery and my conditioner is coming out too watery." Poor reasoning in chemistry, but whatever, I was running out of patience. I was going to wait a day to add any cool-down ingredients, but it separated before that, so woohoo, I didn't waste any preservatives.
Sixth attempt omitted cyclomethicone on the logic that "it's watery and my conditioner is coming out too watery." Poor reasoning in chemistry, but whatever, I was running out of patience. I was going to wait a day to add any cool-down ingredients, but it separated before that, so woohoo, I didn't waste any preservatives.
SD conditioner try #4
For attempt number four I decided I'd try to follow a recipe as closely as I was able in hopes of better results. I chose this one: Shiny Locks Intensive Conditioner. The only thing I had to change was that instead of 4% stearyl alcohol and 3% cetyl alcohol, I had to use 7% cetearyl (i.e. 3.5% each stearyl and cetyl) because I don't have any sterayl on its own. I also added 0.5% dimethicone instead of 0.1% by accident. I used a mix of 1% sodium benzoate and 0.5% potassium sorbate as the preservatives, dissolved in a little water I reserved for the purpose.
The heated water phase contained 2% stearamidopropyl dimethylamine, 0.3% citric acid, 0.5% panthenol, 3% cetrimonium chloride, and q.s. water. The heated oil phase contained 7% cetearyl alcohol, 2% cyclomethicone, and 0.5% dimethicone. I heated to 70°C and held for 20 minutes, poured the water phase into the oil phase, and mixed. The result was white (not instantly separating) and water thin. I added the preservatives in the bit of reserved water at 45°C and left it to sit for a while.
It separated again.
The heated water phase contained 2% stearamidopropyl dimethylamine, 0.3% citric acid, 0.5% panthenol, 3% cetrimonium chloride, and q.s. water. The heated oil phase contained 7% cetearyl alcohol, 2% cyclomethicone, and 0.5% dimethicone. I heated to 70°C and held for 20 minutes, poured the water phase into the oil phase, and mixed. The result was white (not instantly separating) and water thin. I added the preservatives in the bit of reserved water at 45°C and left it to sit for a while.
It separated again.
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