Home Cosmetic Science Talk Formulating Cationic anomaly with water coming out of the formula.

  • Cationic anomaly with water coming out of the formula.

    Posted by Graillotion on April 27, 2024 at 5:22 pm

    Aloha,

    I have two formulas I have been working on for the past couple of years, so have made each well over 100 times. Know them better than my family.

    In my proverbial pursuit of perfection, I am still chasing emulsifier combinations. I consider myself almost a cationic virgin when it comes to cationic or partially cationic emulsions.

    Recently I have been experimenting with non-ionic M 202 combined with 1% of active material of VariSoft EQ 65 aka: Distearoylethyl Dimonium Chloride (and) Cetearyl Alcohol.

    Especially in the deo (emulsified cream), I thought this was almost perfection in the realm of haptics. I sent off a few samples to my crew….and it was mentioned that some water had accumulated in the dome of the container, and it was suspected that maybe it was capped before full cool down. Hence the next few interactions I went bat $hit crazy on cooling before capping (hours and hours). You guessed it…still the same issue. The deo formula is all but devoid of humectants.

    Fast forward a few days, my fascination with the haptics….leads me to try it on my crazy moisturizing face cream. Again…got a magical haptic….but after using, when I come back to it the next day… I can pour off about 1 to 1.5 drops of water. The emulsification is beautiful. So I am thinking….maybe I have hit the Holy Grail of humectancy….but I realize the headspace is too small to accumulate that much water in a 24 hour span, so it has to be coming from the formula. I put the drops of exudate onto a paper towel, to confirm that it was water, and the paper test seemed to confirm this.

    So what I am asking…. do cationics (the only thing I have changed) have some property in an emulsion that would reflect this result? Am I missing something?

    I think the next version I will try using SPDMA in lieu of the VariSoft EQ 65.

    @Perry44 I know you have worked with cationics….anything jump out at you?

    nkpalaci replied 1 month ago 2 Members · 4 Replies
  • 4 Replies
  • Graillotion

    Member
    April 27, 2024 at 5:26 pm

    And yes…I have removed all anionic antagonist, X-gum etc…and using a low charge count chelate at a very low rate.

    • nkpalaci

      Member
      June 24, 2024 at 10:44 am

      Just to know, did you have problems melting varisoft EQ65? Days ago trying to make a cream it took an hour to melt. It is no longer economically convenient if this is the case, and it also did not emulsify well, perhaps due to the mixture of ions that you mention.

  • Graillotion

    Member
    April 27, 2024 at 5:43 pm

    It is probably noteworthy….and somewhat my hunch…. that there are NO water gelling ingredients, since all I had on hand were anionic. So, in process of acquiring Polyquaternium-37 (looking at you @chemicalmatt ) and HEC. However, both products are thick creams.

  • Graillotion

    Member
    April 29, 2024 at 4:20 am

    Swapped the VariSoft EQ 65 with SPDMA….and cursory observations are looking good. Need to stress it a bit….and see what it looks like.

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