[Abbass_1]

Belassi said:

ozgirl has the best answer. Sodium citrate is an electrolyte, you overshot the salt curve. they added preservatives such as Benzyl Alcohol at 0.5% and Phenoxyethanol at 0.9% overkill. We use sodium benzoate at 0.4% and pH 5 and have never had a problem. Don’t use potassium sorbate, the shampoo will turn yellow.

what did you mean by the preservative overkill?

[Abbass_1]

Cafe33 said:

ngarayeva001, that is a bizarre… I buy SLES for around 1.40-1.50 USD per kg, And I only need to purchase a kilo. Drums of it are much cheaper. 

I cannot find sodium olefin sulfonate other than from Stepan and Univar and I have to buy drums and it is much more expensive. 

Speaking of expensive, I have been making my first liquid body washes / Shampoos. 

12 % SLSa 
8% SCI (Jordapon, no stearic acid)
12 % CAPB (30% Active)
0.5% Fragrance 

It is impressive how well it thickened without the use of NaCl. 

My next batch will make use of NaCl and maybe adding some Decyl Glucoside, not too impressed with the foaming and adding more SLSa is just too expensive. 

How did the glucoside formulation turn out?

[Abbass_1]

I think there is incompatibility between sodium lactate (anionic) and benzalkonium chloride (cationic). 

Changing the order of addition may get rid of the reaction but may still pose stability challenges. You can try getting rid of either, or reducing their concentrations (or that of either) and see.

[Abbass_1]

Pharma said:

Use distilled or demineralised water .

I should, but it is rather expensive. I was finding a way of lowering the cost by using tap water.

[Abbass_1]

Perry said:

What is your specific question?

My Question is: just like we have pH control for preservatives and anionic/cationic surfactants, do we have the same for TDS?

[Abbass_1]

chemicalmatt said:

Use GMS - Self Emulsifying, instead of “non” there and you may be OK. Not much oil to emulsify there either. I’d use a higher HLB co-emulsifier if you decide to increase that oil load. PEG-150 Stearate (HLB ~ 12) comes to mind, and not much of it.  I’ll leave the HLB math up to you. As for books on cosmetic emulsifiers, try the Allured index or buy Perry’s starter book. 

Thank you.

I have read Perry’s book (the one he co-edited) Conditioning Agents for Hair and Skin. I am more interested in first principle books- the ones that explain the process of emulsification itself, has data on practical use of emulsifiers in cosmetics. 

[Abbass_1]

ngarayeva001 said:

“Do I need to emulsify the cetearyl alcohol also?” if your question is whether you should count cetearyl alcohol in your HLB calculation as oil the answer is yes.

I meant should I count the cetearyl alcohol as a lipid that needs to be emulsified.