ketchito
Forum Replies Created
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@Zara Yes, you can use Lamesoft PO65 and still get a clear formula. There’s a shampoo formula with Lamesoft PO65 by BASF on Ulprospector, that you can use as reference: https://www.ulprospector.com/es/la/PersonalCare/Detail/1960/113833/Clear-NPA-Shampoo-Formulation-US-00797-030?doc=1027988&st=20.
As @Belassi mentioned, not everyone like the effect of Lamesoft PO65 on hair, so you have to test is to see if it feels ok for you, and especially at which dose it gives the best result.
I’d advise to use PQ-10 as well (consider that it’s derived from Cellulose, so it’s on natural origin), of Guar hydroxypropyltrimonium chloride, for both film forming and as aid for oil deposition.
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@Nikifarokhi I believe Dimethicone and Isododecane are ok when mixing with your waxes at high temperature, but Cyclopentasiloxane should be added not higher than 40-45C.
Castor oil is indeed incompatible with some silicones. You can find here a link on information of compatible/incompatible materials you can use with Cyclomethicone, as a reference: https://samaro.fr/pdf/FT/XIAMETER_FT_PMX_0245-CYCLOPENTASILOXANE___EN_.pdf.
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@filiz I recommend you to approach a pH of 6 before adding the Betaine. You might notice an increase in viscosity compared to your other formulas, since Betaine will be mostly in the zwitterionic state and interact better with SLES, allowing you to add less salt to reach your viscosity.
If this doesn’t work, try to either increase SLES (1 or 2% increase would be fine), or increase Betaine (1% would be ok). In both cases you’ll notice an increase in viscosity without much salt compared to your previos tests.
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@Padmavathi I’m glad you managed to make it clear. Good luck!
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@stephm212 It’s a bit hard to tell since many of the ingredients are blends, so you won’t get the real order of each ingredient in the formula, but I might think the glycerin could be the issue.
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@Zara I’d actually add some silicone, unless you want to avoid them. You could also add glyceryl oleate, or even a surfactant that has a nice after feel, like Sodium cocoyl glutamate (only watch for your final viscosity since it tends to reduce it).
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@Ktlo as @Pharma mentioned, you can get a thicker honey so it doesn’t drip at the start. You can even increase honey’s viscosity by adding glucose or sucrose (common sugar), to make the solution more “concentrated”.
I used to formulate wound dressings for a biotech group, and I remember that the antimicrobial properties of honey on wound healing were due to its ability to greatly reduce water activity. Nevertheless, since glucose, fructore, sucrose, etc., have low water permeation when they are applied to the skin (they are very water soluble and the lipid layer of the SC is, wel…lipidish), honey would not actually be a good humectant but quite the opposite (and that’s why it works for wound healing). Glycerin on the other hand has a different partition coefficient and holds less water, so it can permeate better.
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@Ola I understand. I would still lower the Dimethicone to prevent build-up, and add a bit of PQ-7 (PQ-10 might be too much in terms of build-up) for better and more even deposition of the silicone.
Did you try your prototype already? Try it first with Dimethicone 3-4%, PQ-7 (10% w/w) at 1%, Cetyl alcohol 4-5% and without Phenoxyethanol. If you need more slip, you can start increasing the Dimethicone…and I wouldn’t increase butters (they actually reduce slip) and natural oils (they just don’t feel so nice on hair).
Also, I noticed you added coco-betaine. Any particular reason for that? It wouldn’t be on my lineup of ingredients for a conditioner, which of course doesn’t mean you can’t use it.
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@Spadirect Not talking about the efficacy (which might be low for certain strains), being an ether you could expect that the presence of surfactants (especially non ionic) will make the ether more available in the oil phase of the emulsion rather than in the water phase, so it’d be better to add another preservative more water soluble.
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@filiz You can increase the SLES a bit, or the Betaine, or the Sodium chloride.
Also, you don’t want to go too down on pH, since Betaine would behave as a cationic and react with the SLES (don’t go lower than 6). Actually, you can test if a raise on pH would increase viscosity. Do you want your pH range to be between 5.5 - 6.0 for an specific reason?
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@Padmavathi Yes, you can put one sample on the fridge just for testing, to see if cooling rate here is an issue.
Also, maybe you can make a sample without Castor oil, since it has triglycerides, which need to be broken down first to have free fatty acids for saponification. Again, just as a test.
Water loss could affect clarity, although it might not be the issue here. Just to be sure, you can make another test using a bit of excess water to see if clarity improves.
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Hi @Prashy123. The benchmarks you mentioned have different formulas to the one you posted. I’d recommend you to check some books with already stabilized formulas, like “Poucher’s Perfumes, Cosmetics and Soaps”, and “Cosmetic and Toiletry Formulations” (you can find them in servers like genesis library).
Regarding your questions, I’d first add a base (TEA or NaOH) to the water phase, so you can neutralize your Stearic acid and turn it into an emulsifier.
Your Kojic acid dipalmitate has an extremely high melting point (94-97C). When you make an emulsion, you need to be few grades above the highest melting point, and unless you have an in-line high shear emulsifier, it’d be very difficult to make the emulsion without having this ingredient crystallizing before being emulsified, not to mention that you have too many solid ingredients in your oil phase which make emulsion droplets too rigid and not so flexible (you could reduce some, or replace by liquid ones), which would also account for the issue you’re experiencing. Natural beeswax is also a bit hard to emulsify, just so you know.
Also, without a silicone or mineral oil, your formula won’t have good slip, especially if you have butters (Caprylic capric triglyceride will absorb too fast).You could actually reduce your Xanthan gum, but not so much, since your water phase should also have viscosity, let’s say up to 0.2%.
Check also your preservative system, since I’m not sure it’ll be enough for your product.
And also, you need to check what actually “natural and oil free” means, if you’re gonna market this product, since many of the ingredients are not precisely natural, and for sure it’s not an oil-free formulation (at least technically speaking)…maybe it’d be better to say without leaving and oily residue, or something like that.
Good luck!
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@Ola I’d actually reduce Cetyl alcohol a bit, so the product is not so thick and can spread good along hair fibers. I’d remove Phenoxyethanol, since Germall Plus should be enough to preserve the system. I’d definitely reduce Dimethicone, and maybe even replace part of it by Amodimethicone, which has more affinity and builds up less. D-panthenol at that level might be too much…it’s actually more active when applied to skin.
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@Ichlas The problem is that it can migrate from the packaging to your product.
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@Sam I’d suggest to check formulations on internet similar to the one you’re trying to make. The HLB system rather than telling you how much of emulsifier you need, it tells you is the nature of that emulsifier is suitable for the type of oils you want to emulsify. As a very general rule, you can consider a ratio emulsifier:oils of 1:4 or 1:5. It’s better if you count the Cetearyl alcohol as part of your oil phase. If it doesn’t work, you might consider changing the emulsifier (I don’t think you could calculate the HLB of your TEA-stearate since it’s an anionic emulsifier, and they have many limitations compared to non ionic emulsifiers).
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@Padmavathi It’s ok that you mix both saponified oils with surfactants. My point is that you might not have used enough NaOH, so part of the fatty acids were not converted into soaps themselves, but rather stayed as fatty acids. So, when you mix them with your synthetic surfactants, you’d emulsify them, similar to when you mix cooking oil with water and detergent. Some companies actually leave part of the fatty acids unsaponified, since they give humectancy and there’s less free alkalinity in the system, but the product is of course not transluscent.
By cooling rate I was thinking more about trying to cool the soaps rather fast to avoid tight packaging of surfactants (similar to when you make glass, which is cooled fast so it stays as an amorphous inner structure that lets light pass without scattering).
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@pepe I’m also very familiar with Emulgade 165, but at least for the description, Emulgade SE seems like a very nice combo: one low HLB emulsifier, two high HLB emulsifiers, a fatty alcohol and a high melting point ester. The mixture of low and high HLB emulsifiers give a more stable emulsion (Emulgade 165 was designed under the same principle), while the incorporation of two waxes (a fatty alcohol and a high melting point ester) makes the crystalline network more rigid, resulting in higher viscosity (that’s why you add fatty alcohols in emulsions) and more stability. You could actually do this on your own, but I believe Emulgade SE has a very specific and synergistic ratio. At least, I’d try it.
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@Padmavathi Perhaps your fatty acids or castor oil are not being completely neutralized, and either being emulsified by surfactants or just migrate to the center and crystalize due to cooling down. Also, cooling rate could have an effect on transparency.
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@Leo Citric acid in a liquid soap at a pH above 9 will be present as its salt (Citrate) rather than the acid form.
Regarding the need for a preservative, if your idea is not to include one, there are a couple of readings you might want to take a look at: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1468-2494.2009.00492.x, https://makingskincare.com/preservatives/.
So, pH as a sole strategy could be tricky, since being at least at a pH of 10 for shrinking the risk of microbial growth (I’ve seen products being contaminated at pH around 9), can also mean that you might have free alkalinity in your product. Of course this is more sensitive for leave on products, but for individuals with reactive skin (not to mention if the product reaches your eyes) and under repetitive use, that might cause some problems.
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Hi @anani1:
1. I don’t think the list of ingredients is in order of dosage; also, polyquats can bind to water once deposited on hair, glycol distearate also works as non-occlusive humectant, and dimethicone works giving some occlusive humectancy
2. Sulfates are not the evil, they just need to be properly used in a formulation….and silicones are actually the best friends of curly girls3. Sodium citrate could work in two ways in that formula: as a water softener (only a weak one), and as part of a buffer system.
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@Leo If you have a liquid soap, you’d need to go very low on pH to prevent microbial growth, and as @Dr_Sara mentioned, it’ll impair foam and detergency, and it’d also increase the chance of instability (for instance, CAPB behaves as a cationic at low pH, which will interact with anionic surfactants forming a precipitate). It can be done, but you should be very careful with the ingredient selection…also, you’ll need a very good GMP system in place to guatantee that your water for instance is of very high quality, since low pH helps prevent microbial growth, but it won’t avoid your product being contamined from external sources.
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@ankitanks I know this question was not for me, but I remember I read an article about Ethylhexylglycerin and Panthenol being better humectants than Glycerin, since they don’t reduce alcohol’s potency.
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@shellyco I would leave some EDTA (0.05-0.1%), it actually reduces oxidation of the fatty part of your quat and fragrance. The amount of IPA is a bit high, unless your final product with 8% of Stepanquat GA 90 is too thick, although it might impair micelle formation at that level, so you can also reduce it.
You can also improve your softening performance by adding a silicone (preferable emulsified, so it doesn’t mess up with your viscosity). I’d also add a fatty alcohol ethoxylate (like laureth-9 or 7), to prevent formation of insoluble complexes between anionic (from detergent) and cationic (from softener) surfactants.
Check if the thermal stability of your product is ok…usually, products with over 8% of quats tend to destabilize a bit, so a rheology modifiers could be useful.
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@Nilesh May I ask which preservative are you using (and at which dose)?
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@Econatural Both Potassium sorbate and especially Sodium benzoate are not quite soluble in Ethanol, so you can make one sample without these materials to see if the problem is fixed…also, if you’re using more than 20% of Ethanol (which I believe is your case), chances are that you don’t need preservatives.