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Shampoo Formulation-Ingredients
I’m trying to make a shampoo/conditioner with the following ingredients. I’m new to this, but after mixing the ingredients some observations were it was too thin (watery) and glycol disterate didn’t suspend. Also used a household blender, wondering if I should purchase a shear mixer? Also to lower PH I would add citric acid at the end? Add salt as the last ingredient after mixing? I mixed the below solution without heat. I also tried it with heat at 70-75 degrees celcius and the glycol disterate didn’t suspend in mixture (left white flakes everywhere. I’m also using almost all liquid ingredients.Distilled water: 100%Sodium Laureth Sulfate: 8%Laureth 4: 0.5%Cocamidoproyl Betaine: 2%Polyquaternium 7: 2%Glycol Disterate: 2%Guarhydroypropthronium Chloride: 0.2%DMDM Hydantoin: 0.5%Glycerin: 2%Panthenol B5: 0.5%Sodium Chloride: 0.5% (Iodized Table Salt)Citric Acid: 1%Dyes: Ext D&C Violet No.2, FD&C Blue No.1, D&C Red No.33 approx 0.5% or lessFragrance: approx 0.5% or less -
18 Replies
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the most useful thing to do here is to take a step back, and work out whether it’s a formulation issue or a method-of-manufacture issue
leave out your glycol distearate, polyquat-7 and guar hydroxypropyltrimonium chloride (these are the ingredients which necessitate a more complex method) and try again, without heat
you don’t need to use a blender or a shear mixer to mix shampoo; in fact, you could mix it by hand if you’re patient enough
also, 1% citric acid will make it incredibly acidic, and this will not help the viscosity - try 0.1% instead
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Double the surfactants
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To keep the glycol distearate suspended you will need a reasonably viscous product so you will need to increase your viscosity. As David has suggested above try increasing your surfactant concentration.
Avoid high speed stirring because all you will do is create bubbles.
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I appreciate all the great advice!
1.) My next batch I will leave out the glycol distearate, polyquat-7 and guar hydroxypropyltrimonium chloride and see what happens. For future batches I would like to include these ingredients in the formulation, being I’m trying to make this formulation identical to an Irish Spring hair/body shampoo that was discontinued while creating it from home. If that’s possible?
2.) I will increase the surfactant to 16%, which should add viscosity. If the surfactant increase alone doesn’t add enough viscosity maybe adjust the sodium chloride (salt)?
3.) The high speed mixing did create a lot of foam with plenty of white flakes of glycol disterate. I will mixing slower and drop the citric acid to 0.1%.
4.) The main thing I’m concerned about with this formulation is making it as close to a product they sell on the shelf and do it from home. Is this even possible?
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I was going through all this for months and finally I found that a premixed blend gave such superior performance to my own that I simply used that as a base and got excellent results.
There is a vast number of shampoos on the shelves using the SLS/SLES/CAPB salt thickened trinity and there is an infinite number of variations of percentages. In the end I concluded that I’d spend the rest of my life messing around and found that Plantarem APB was so superior to my best effort that I adopted that. Texapon KD S03 is an equivalent. -
And one more thing: When a consumer can buy a 400mL bottle of shampoo in the dollar store, do you really want to compete?
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So I just made solution again without the glycol distearate, polyquat-7 and guarhydroxypropyltrimonium chloride. I doubled the Sodium Laureth Sulfate from 8% to 16% and reduced the citric Acid from 1% to 0.1%. I increased the Sodium Chloride at the end to 1.5%-2%, which gave me a much thicker solution very close to Irish Spring hair/body soap. Still need to find the exact Sodium Chloride, but right now it’s on the high side to get a thick solution.
New Mixture:
Distilled water: 100%
Sodium Laureth Sulfate: 16%
Laureth 4: 0.5%
Cocamidoproyl Betaine: 2%
DMDM Hydantoin: 0.5%
Glycerin: 2%
Panthenol B5: 0.5%
Sodium Chloride: 0.5% (Iodized Table Salt)
Citric Acid: 0.1%
Dyes: Ext D&C Violet No.2, FD&C Blue No.1, D&C Red No.33 approx .02%Left out the following ingredients:
Polyquaternium 7: 0%
Glycol Disterate: 0%
Guarhydroypropthronium Chloride: 0%
Fragrance: 0%This new solution came out pretty good, and I did use it on hair. Overall I think the PH might be a little high right now, I need to get a digital PH tester. I’m thinking the PH is 8-9, and not sure if the increase in sodium chloride would contribute to a higher PH.
The shampoo mixture seemed to work great, but now I need to find a way to incorporate the other ingredients. I do notice without the remaining ingredients it is missing that glowing (pearlizing effect) on skin tone that I think glycol disterate would provide? Any suggestions of how to include the two remaining conditioning ingredients and glycol disterate into this mix?
Belassi: I also might include Plantarem APB later on. Would I need to take out ingredients to include that?
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Belassi, not trying to compete with any brand of shampoo/conditioner. Being this shampoo/conditioner was recently dis-continued I just want to use for myself in the future.
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for a pearl effect, the simplest way, and the way many commercial manufacturers do it, is to use a pre-mixed pearliser blend (there are many available from assorted chemical suppliers)
you can try adding it the old-fashioned way, but you’ll have to melt your glycol distearate first, and ensure the main batch is hot enough for it not to crash out; for best results you’ll also need a rotor/stator shear mixer, as a blender will aerate itsodium chloride is neutral, it won’t affect the pH -
For the pearl effect, I like the idea of adding a pre-mixed pearliser. Is there a pre-mixed pearlizer you would recommend as being the best? That would also already be mixed with surfactants, then I could reduce my sodium laureth sulfate if needed depending on what the pre-mix pearlizer included. If I get a pre-mixed pearlizer I can mix it in just like a regular shampoo with no heat? Is the rotor/stator shear mixer only required if I were to melt the glycol disterate, or do I need it for the pre-mix solution as well?
For the remaining conditioning ingredients:
polyquat-7
guar hydroxypropyltrimonium chloride
Decyl GlucosideCan those be added with a certain shear mixer, or heat?
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Mike, Plantarem APB is a complete blend. Let’s see …
water, Plantarem APB blend 20%, CAPB 5%, Aloe Vera x10 extract 0.1%, Lamesoft 1%, Sodium benzoate 0.5%, Polyquart H-81 1%It’s a conditioning shampoo. More softness? Increase the Lamesoft. More cationic? Increase the Polyquart. -
I might try Plantarem APB next, but the current ingredients I’m using now change the skin tone of the face so I’m trying to stay with them. I’m not sure which of the ingredients I’m using that does change it, I’m thinking maybe the laureth 4 or DMDM Hydantoin, or one of the uncommon ingredients in the shampoo mix I used…..The shampoo mix I made without including the conditioners came out great for hair and skin tone besides missing the pearlizing affect. I would like to stay with the shampoo ingredients for now and include one of the following cold process pearlizing agents. I notice Quickpearl™ PK3 Pearlizing Agent includes three of the surfactants I already have in my mix, so that is my top pick right now to include in the cold process shampoo. Any suggestions on what might be the best pick, or one that is better than all of these?
1.) Quuickpearl 1: Sodium Lauryl Sulfate and Glycol Stearate
2.) Quickpearl II: Sodium Laureth Sulfate and Glycol Stearate
3.) Quickpearl™ PK3 Pearlizing Agent: Glycol Disterate, Laureth 4 and Cocamidopropyl Betaine -
Also might increase Cocamidopropyl Betaine in next batch to help
moisturize skin, depending on surfactant levels in Quickpearl. I need to
look into the amounts of surfactants in Quickpearl… -
I’m currently buying ingredients from the personal formulator website. I can’t find anybody online that sells PK3 Pre-mix pearlizer, any suggestions of where to purchase? I sent an email to lubrizol, but not sure if they sell it.
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Lubrizol don’t usually do direct sales in small quantities; they have local distributors for this
quaternised guar gum will have a significant effect on conditioning and moisturising; there is a particular technique which needs to be followed to disperse it successfully, which is why I initially suggested leaving it out to keep things simple
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I’m wondering about the activity level of your SLS.
If you are using 16% of a 28% solution your detergent level is actually 4.8%, probably too low. I would say the minimum anionic surfactant in a shampoo would be 8% -
BASF also have a range of pre-mixed pearlescents (Trade Name - Euperlan). Unfortunately I don’t know where these are available to purchase in the US but someone might be able to help.
Are pearlized products still popular in the US? In Australia they have gone out of fashion and very few of the shampoos actually contain them.
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Try Empipearls from Huntsman, they too come in different combinations.
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