Home Cosmetic Science Talk Formulating Glycol Stearate in anhydrous formulation?

  • Glycol Stearate in anhydrous formulation?

    Posted by dmh0023 on January 29, 2014 at 1:08 pm

    I have glycol stearate for purposes of pearlizing. Is there any way to incorporate it into an anhydrous oil formulation? Or does it need to be mixed with water? If it won’t work in just oil, do you know of another pearlizing agent that does?

    Cheers!
    Bill_Toge replied 10 years, 10 months ago 6 Members · 9 Replies
  • 9 Replies
  • Chemist77

    Member
    January 29, 2014 at 1:26 pm

    Why don’t you make a slurry of normal pearls in one of the oils of your formula and use it, lipsticks and lipglosses are anhydrous and richly pearlized.
    Or (not sure about this one) use the glycol stearate with an emulsifier in your formula, btw what is the composition? Accordingly choose the emulsifier.

  • dmh0023

    Member
    January 29, 2014 at 2:23 pm

    Thank you for the reply! Sorry for the newb question, but how do I make a slurry of pearls in an oil? If I could do that, and avoid this whole combining emulsifier mess, that would be awesome. I currently use cromollient alone as the emulsifier in my formula. at about 8% to 10%. How would I combine the glycol stearate with the cromollient - heat both, combine and blend thoroughly? 

  • chemicalmatt

    Member
    January 29, 2014 at 4:50 pm

    dmh0023, GMS will not form any pearlescence without emulsifying in water, so an anhydrous pearl isn’t going to happen that way. If you’ve got to have that pearly appearance, and your formula has no water, just add one of the many pretty mica blends (aka “glitter”) and be sure to suspend it well.

  • Bobzchemist

    Member
    January 30, 2014 at 9:41 am

    Just to satisfy my curiosity, why do you have an emulsifier in an anhydrous product at all?

    Another point, product names usually mean something. When you see an ending of “mollient” that’s a very good indication that it’s an emollient, and not a surfactant. What is it? 
  • Chemist77

    Member
    January 30, 2014 at 9:59 am

    @Bobz I think the best option for him/her is to use pearl pigments from BASF, Merck, Geotech, Engelhard (was taken over) and so on and so forth. Glycol stearate can completely be eliminated and especially since its an anhydrous product.
    But I am still unaware what is the product.

  • dmh0023

    Member
    January 30, 2014 at 8:39 pm

    Hi guys. Sorry for the delay! The product is an oil cleanser. Basically a blend of different vegetable oils and an emulsifier (cromollient) that causes the oils to rinse off the face easily. 

    I would LOVE to suspend mica in the cleanser, but it all floats to the bottom after a few hours. :( I actually posted a topic a couple weeks ago about that, but couldn’t find a resolution. I couldn’t figure out what to use as a suspending agent since the product has no water. 
    I received some liquid lecithin recently so will be playing around with that. But yea, I’m trying to achieve a mica/pearly look and so far have been continually defeated, haha. 
  • mikebavington

    Member
    January 30, 2014 at 10:21 pm

    Cera Belina as a stability agent

  • Bobzchemist

    Member
    January 31, 2014 at 12:28 pm

    Just to let you know - Cromollient is a brand name - it’s like saying Ford. There are at least 6 different Cromollient chemicals, each with different properties. We won’t ever know how to help you much if you don’t tell us which one you’re using.

  • Bill_Toge

    Member
    January 31, 2014 at 6:11 pm

    have you tried fumed silica or hydrophobically modified fumed silica (e.g. Aerosil, ex Evonik/Degussa)?

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