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How to properly hydrate and dissolve Polyquaternium-10?
I tried leaving PQ-10 in bare water overnight
also heating and stirring it
but it always seems to form some thick, non uniform clumps.Maybe it has to do with it being too concentrated?
I added 0.7% PQ-10, but only with 50% water (1.4% overall concentration) to allow room for other liquid ingredients to be added later.Any ideas or suggestions?
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17 Replies
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Try a very mild alkaline neutralisation if your formulation isn’t averse to it though you can always adjust the pH at the end. I have observed the same and realised that an immediate and a very mild alkaline neutralisation will help you get a very uniform dispersion. I add it in my hot process shampoo during cool down phase mixed with Methocel 40-202, no issues at all.
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This is very strange. I used polyquat 10 of 3 different suppliers and never had issues with it. What I normally do, I slurry it in glycerin like xanthan, then I add it to water (not even 50% but maybe 20) and stir at low speed for 10 minutes. And even when there are some minor clumps they hydrate in the product overnight. Try to slurry it. 4 parts of glycerin to 1 part of polyquat 10.
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Chemist77 said:Try a very mild alkaline neutralisation if your formulation isn’t averse to it though you can always adjust the pH at the end. I have observed the same and realised that an immediate and a very mild alkaline neutralisation will help you get a very uniform dispersion. I add it in my hot process shampoo during cool down phase mixed with Methocel 40-202, no issues at all.
Is it normal for it to thicken right after adding the alkali?
I tried
water 50%
Polyquaternium-10 0.7%
TEA 0.5 ml
pH was about 9. Is that OK?ngarayeva001 said:This is very strange. I used polyquat 10 of 3 different suppliers and never had issues with it. What I normally do, I slurry it in glycerin like xanthan, then I add it to water (not even 50% but maybe 20) and stir at low speed for 10 minutes. And even when there are some minor clumps they hydrate in the product overnight. Try to slurry it. 4 parts of glycerin to 1 part of polyquat 10.May I ask for how long do you leave PQ-10 in glycerin?
I left it for several hours, and the slurry became very thick, almost solid with a yellow/brown color. -
I just mix it and add right away. How much PQ10, glycerin and water did you use? I am quite surprised and want to run an experiment. I will post a picture.
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Hi @Gunther, I slurried 1.5% of PQ10 in 4% of glycerin and added to water (qs to 100). I didn’t even used an overhead stirrer, just mixed it with a spatula for a couple of minutes.
There are some air bubbles obviously but no clumps at all. Please let me know whether this process works for you. -
ngarayeva001 said:I just mix it and add right away. How much PQ10, glycerin and water did you use? I am quite surprised and want to run an experiment. I will post a picture.
I left glycerin+PQ10 standing for several hours, so it became solid.
Now I will try adding it to water right after a couple minutes and post back.
Thanks for the suggestion. -
Very strange. I just springle on water mix for 30 minutes and heat to 70C. Never had a problem.
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This morning
no bubbles and you can see it dissolved completely. -
Can it be that we use different pq 10 with different molecular weights?
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@Gunther I just sprinkle PQ-10 in water and a very very low dosage of an alkali which immediately thickens the solution. It is clear as well; based on samples being churned out in the lab, can’t afford overnight and hourly waiting for wetting 🙂
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Chemist77 said:@Gunther I just sprinkle PQ-10 in water and a very very low dosage of an alkali which immediately thickens the solution. It is clear as well; based on samples being churned out in the lab, can’t afford overnight and hourly waiting for wetting 🙂
What happens if you don’t add an alkali?
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Well then I guess you need to follow precisely what @ngarayeva001 suggested. It will just sit at the bottom and after absorbing water, it will become lumpy. Extra work then to make it homogenous.
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By the way you don’t even need to wait for several minutes. Just slurry it and add. And then mix. There were no clumps after 5 minutes. I just posted a next day photo because there were air bubbles there on the first day.
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Chemist77 said:@Gunther I just sprinkle PQ-10 in water and a very very low dosage of an alkali which immediately thickens the solution. It is clear as well; based on samples being churned out in the lab, can’t afford overnight and hourly waiting for wetting 🙂
Thank you
May I ask what’s a nice, tiny alkali dosage?
I tried
Water about 50%
PQ-10 0.7%
TEA 0.5%pH rised to 9, which needed quite a bit of citric acid to bring it back and ended up thickening the end formulation too much (maybe TEA citrate being a salt thickens SLES just as NaCl does)
How much alkali do you tipically use?ngarayeva001 said:By the way you don’t even need to wait for several minutes. Just slurry it and add. And then mix. There were no clumps after 5 minutes. I just posted a next day photo because there were air bubbles there on the first day.Thanks a lot. I will try pouring it right away and then report back.
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I have 18% solution of sodium hydroxide and if I do the proper weighing it will be probably 0.01% approximately. I don’t keep TEA in my lab generally, so it’s either that alkali solution or AMP-95 Ultra PC 2000.
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According to Dow,
You must first prepare a 2% solution by stirring for 45-60 minutesIn a separate vessel, prepare the 2% solution of UCARE™ Polymer by mixing the ingredients of Phase E (Polyquaternium 10) and stirring until a clear, homogenous, slightly viscous solution is obtained (45 – 60 minutes). -
Does adding water to slurry or the other way around make a difference?
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