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It might be a good idea to state first which country you are in …

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“As we saw in the phase diagram chapter, it is
possible for a modestly viscous surfactant solution to be diluted with water to a
hoped-for low viscosity solution but then get trapped in some hexagonal or cubic
phase where it sits around in big globules that annoy either the production line
or, even worse, the customer.”

 - This is EXACTLY what happened to one of my designs. I ended up with a bowling ball made of surfactant and water!

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From the book: 

“It is interesting to note that where surfactant theory is really important (billions of
dollars at stake) the world-wide community uses HLD theory. Where the theory
is not so important (e.g. in the cosmetics industry where many formulations are
copies of other formulations) the world-wide community uses ideas long-since
shown to be erroneous.”

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Mark’s note is very apt. When I began, shea was one of my first ingredients and I bought several kilos of organic shea butter. There was no problem and the product worked fine, but it was a total pain having to melt it, maintain temperature in fluid form while all the crap settled out, then decant and filter before use. There are an awful lot of impurities in “organic” shea. Use it as it comes and your product will be full of muck. These days I use purified shea.

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dipotassium glycyrrhizate has been noted as beneficial.

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Link

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Stepan has a lot of different surfactants. I have been reading the PDFs but none of them state the important thing, which is: which ones thicken with salt?

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I spent about two years experimenting. My fundamental problem is that one supplier won’t supply what I need: AKYPO FOAM RL 40. (thickens with salt)

An alternative will be to replace the third surfactant with a taurate so I am talking to Stepan about that.

If I can get rid of the expensive thickener I am going to halve my cost of production and at the same time have a sulphate-free shampoo that is as foamy as SLS/SLES.

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Naturally sourced. I am pretty sure my surfactant combination is all naturally sourced and not derived from petrochemicals. The only thing that bothers me slightly is the sodium hydroxide. It’s necessary because I’m using a pure carboxylic acid with a pH of 3, as the primary surfactant. The result of course is sodium laureth-6 carboxylate and water, there’s no NaOH left after neutralising.

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I am confusing “vegan” with “naturally sourced”. I hadn’t realised that “vegan” also means things such as SLS! 

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http://www.idchem.com/htm/products/ethoxylate%20&%20peg/peg/peg-4000.php

Basically just a water soluble filler.

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Thank you Sethr! Absolute garbage! And they think that potassium chloride is somehow not “salt”.

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No. My own blend is carboxylate + CAPB + sodium cocoamphoacetate. It is superior to the isetheonates blend in Iselux and with less surfactant (25% vs. 29%)

However mine doesn’t salt thicken and the thickener at 4% is as expensive as all the surfactants combined.

I believe that if I replace the cocoampho with the taurate I will get even better foam and at the same time be able to salt thicken.

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Heaven only knows. This is misleading advertising and I am preparing a formal complaint to the consumer protection organisation, PROFECO.

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There is some evidence that caffeine causes apoptosis (cell death) of skin cells that are damaged and tending towards cancerous. This is a good thing. Caffeine is also used in shampoo as a scalp stimulant.

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Great! Thanks Ruben. I can’t resist experimenting and I have about a kilo of liquid papain in stock…

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Thanks Ruben. Since papain dissolves protein, would that be a good choice? But how to get rid of the excess papain afterwards?

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Actually I would like to try hydrolysing carob beans. As I understand it the process involves grinding the material up, dissolving in NaOH, then neutralising it with acid. But what strengths to use? Ah. There lies the rub.

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I’ve asked my Innospec distributor to see if I can get some Taurate. It’s part of their Pureact range. I intend testing it for salt thickening and if it does, I will replace one of my current blend with it, to achieve:

a) even more luxurious foam

b) salt thickening and elimination of expensive thickener costs

I’ve finished evaluating my current formula against the Iselux SFS formulations. Basically, my own formula is faster to first foam (with instant production of creamy foam), produces more foam, has bigger bubbles as well as creaminess, and better sensorials than the Iselux. My production cost for both is almost identical. I’m very happy with my work, to date, and I look forward to producing something even better at an even more competitive price.

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I don’t think Betaine thickens with salt. I just tried it yet again to confirm it. I made a 20% solution of Dehyton KB and progressively added salt up to a total of 5%, in 0.2% increments. At no stage did it thicken.

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From what I find, I think it might be the taurate … anyone?

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Instead of using a synthetic surfactant product, try cold process soap.

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Carbopol by Lubrizol, check the EZ and Ultrez products. For a wetter, try Glucopon 215UP.

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6 weeks? What took so long? 

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What happened? My comment has vanished…