Home Cosmetic Science Talk Formulating Water hardness

  • Water hardness

    Posted by shino_dino on November 2, 2021 at 11:17 pm

    Dear all. 
    Can I check if water hardness affect shower gel base making? I have a shower gel formulation, when my colleague make the shower gel in Spain, the viscosity of the shower gel is stable after adding fragrance. But when I make the shower gel in Asia and after adding fragrance, the shower gel breaks viscosity, it turned watery and cloudy.
    The salt content is 2.45%.
    Does high salt content affect the compatibility of fragrance in the shower gel?
    Appreciate if anyone can guide me on this.

    imported_argser replied 3 years, 1 month ago 5 Members · 6 Replies
  • 6 Replies
  • OldPerry

    Member
    November 3, 2021 at 12:28 am

    Yes salt content affects viscosity. Do a salt curve analysis starting with 1% salt and go up from there

  • Abdullah

    Member
    November 3, 2021 at 7:56 am

    What ingredient does it have and at what percentage?

    Also do both of you use the same fragrance?

  • Paprik

    Member
    November 3, 2021 at 6:03 pm

    Are you saying you both are using the exact same formula and ingredients from the same exact suppliers? This also plays a big role.

    Some surfactants (the foaming ones) does not work well in hard water, some do and some help the others to work in hard water. 

    Does you formula contain chelating agent? 

  • shino_dino

    Member
    November 5, 2021 at 7:15 am

    Same ingredients only difference is deionised water from different country.
    How to experiment on the salt curve?

  • OldPerry

    Member
    November 5, 2021 at 5:44 pm
  • imported_argser

    Member
    November 7, 2021 at 4:51 am

    One quick way to check water hardness, is to visit the US EPA website. They publish the analysis of the public water they treat. In it, you should be able to see the calcium, magnesium and ion levels measured in the treated water samples. This is the reason why formulators use deionised water in their guide formulations, and still add chelating agents like EDTA, to further migitate the risks.

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