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Tea Tree Oil in air freshener -solubilizer
Hello all,
In present I am struggling with an air deodorant
formula that should have by specs 8% of Tea tree oil , preferred not
separated and milky as appearance.Tried the following combinations:
Among the alcohol, tried Tween 20. I have replaced it with a F&EO modifier (from
Crafter’s Choice- I have never found out what type of emulsifier is this
, but works great in clear PC formulations).Tried the natural Poly Suga Mulse D9 , but this just has thickened up the formula,
as being already a salt boosted surfactant.
Any suggestions for a solubilizer, please?
Thanks in advance,
Eva UK -
14 Replies
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8%? Are you sure? That is a very, very high amount. TTO is expensive apart from other considerations.
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Yep! You’re absolutely right!This is what the customer wants….you know that the customer is the boss…I could suggest to reconsider the TTO level, but still trying to integrate it in the water based formula.
What type of solubilizer would you recommend, in general, for EO’s in water based formulas?
Proportion of solub: EO=3:1?Thanks in advance,
Eva -
You might want to consider a glycol ether in addition to a detergent based solubiliser.
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Thanks, John!
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If your are from UK I would recommend you ask your safety assessor first. I haven’t calculated on it but 8% TTO in a deodorant could be declared as unsafe - then you can’t sell it in EU.
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or better still, get an IFRA certificate from your supplier, which will state the exact safe limits for particular product types
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David, I think there is some crosstalk here. The product is an airfreshener, not a personal deo product.
Even so, a TTO fragranced air freshener is not something I would want in my house
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You might try Heptyl Glucoside … Sepiclear G7 from Seppic
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8% does seem very high even for an air freshener. The fragrance of tea tree oil is often not liked by most people so I can’t see why any one would want to use this much in a product.
What is the maximum amount of ethyl alcohol you can use? Is your product allowed to be flammable?
I would recommend using a combination of Ethyl alcohol, Tween 20, and PEG 40 Hydrogenated Castor Oil in an attempt to solubilise your oil. Depending on the oil you could use up to around 10:1 ratio of solubiliser to oil.
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First,thanks for the precious help, all of you!
In order to answer your questions, I would start with my location.
I am from a NW suburb of Chicago, IL and working at Orchidia Fragrances as application scientist.
I don’t like the whole TTO concept either, this is a project for a customer, who would like an air freshener close to the Kanberra product.
Last formula I’ve tried : (TTO 8%+ 16% Tween-20+8% EO modifier), 10% denatured alcohol, Surfadone LP300 as wetting agent-0.2%….DI Water.
So far, this one looks pretty stable,no separation of phases…
I still will try the formulas with PEG40 and Sepiclear G7 after getting the samples in house.
Kindest regards,Eva Unger-Kovacs(UK)
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What form does this A/F take? Spray? Static diffuser? Reed? Othe reservoir with diffuser device?
The reason I ask is that any form other than an active dispersion system, such as a spray, will have large residue (24% or so in your formulation example). The user will see this as an indicator that the product is still active (even though it has lost its smell) and then fail to purchase further product or, worse, complain the air freshener doesn’t work.
This brings me back to my suggestion of a glycol ether as solvent. The product would then be completely or almost completely volatile.
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This should be spray ,that’s why I was watching the viscosity, as well!
Yes, I am working on the glycol ether as solvent! What ratio would you recommend?Thanks!
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If you use glycol ether, or almost any other volatile other than water, you’re going to have a huge problem with VOC’s.
Water is going to be a problem simply because it evaporates too slowly.
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As it’s a spray, non-volatile residues are not so much of a problem.
I remember an A/F spray patent from SCJ that claimed to reduce the number of pathogens in air and which relied on triethylene glycol as a carrier and catcher of airborne particles (including bacteria) trapped by the droplets in the spray.
Actually what the TEG was doing was acting as a solvent for the fragrance in an aqueous base. The other properties were most likely marketing puff.
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