LincsChemist
Forum Replies Created
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I’ve never personally had any problems with disodium EDTA and behentrimonium/cetrimonium chloride.
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If you can get hold of it, I find Chlorphenesin pretty effective, especially in combination with something like Phenoxy
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@Perry Right, ok thanks, that’s very useful to know.
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I’d recommend you try a version with no essential oils in and see if that solves the issue.
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What’s the EO you’re using? It looks like the only likely culprit to me.
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1) Traditional shaving creams are soap based, so they will provide both functions to an extent - when the excess cream/foam is rinsed off, I imagine it will take with it a significant amount of any dirt/oil that as present on the skin. I suppose the answer here is that you haven’t got too separate ingredients in the formulation, one to lubricate and one to cleanse - rather, the formulation as a whole preforms both functions.
2) I imagine the best method here is a straightforward oil-in-water emulsion. In this case, the aqueous phase is the external phase, and so H will get to the skin first, and then as the aqueous phase evaporate A and B will form a layer on the skin, along with any other materials in the oil phase. I’m not sure you could arrange it to get A then B instead of both simultaneously though.
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There’s something not quite right with your formulation if adding salt causes it to lose clarity - it’s perfectly possible to make a crystal-clear surfactant formulation that’s solely salt-thickened. If you post your formulation people can suggest what this might be.
To answer your original question though, I’ve made pretty thick gels with 1-2% HEC, they weren’t surfactant solutions though.
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The transparent shave gels I’ve made would usually be applied by hand, I don’t suppose there’s any reason you couldn’t apply it with a brush. They’re fairly straightforward aqueous gels with some humectants and claims ingredients - depending on the gellant used you can get quite good lubricity.
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Right, think I understand what you’re trying to achieve. You want something that foams up nicely for application but dissipates quickly, leaving behind a transparent lubricating layer. Is that right?
I’m really not sure what you’re looking for is possible, I certainly wouldn’t know how to got about it, I’m afraid. I’ve made some fairly decent non-foaming shave gels that are transparent and stay that way, or you could consider a shave oil, but I think any decent “traditional” foaming shave cream will stay foamed and opaque.
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Have you ever found a product that gives a transparent lather? If so, looking at the ingredients of that might provide a clue, but pretty much all foaming products I’ve ever come across form a white lather.
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There’s a proposal underway to limit D4 and D5 to 0.1% in leave-on products as well
https://echa.europa.eu/nl/registry-of-restriction-intentions/-/dislist/details/0b0236e181a55ade
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My preference is Polysorbate 20, as a liquid it’s a lot easier to work with than some of the other polysorbates or PEG-40 Hydrogenated Castor Oil.
From a natural perspective, Natragem S140 NP (Polyglyceryl-4 Laurate/Sebacate (and) Polyglyceryl-6 Caprylate/Caprate (and) Aqua) is pretty effective
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I believe it’s to do with environmental factors, bioaccumulation particularly. They have already been heavily restricted in rinse-off products but it looks like a total ban is on the way.
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Don’t know where you’re based, but in the EU it’s looking likely that most of the cyclomethicones are going to be banned completely in the next few years, so I wouldn’t recommend using them in any new products. As far as I know you’ll be fine in the States
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Jasmine is something of an acquired taste, I think Rose would be preferred by more people. I’d say though that on it’s own, it can be quite “old-fashioned” - don’t know what your target audience is but I don’t think it would appeal massively to the younger market.
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Usually serums and creams are intended to moisturise, whereas alcohols (ethanol or isopropyl, anyway) are generally quite drying, and customers are becoming aware of that. You’d be better off replacing oils with dry-feeling esters like C12-15 Alkyl Benzoate, or failing that throw some starch in at around 1% - I personally like rice starch, but there’s loads of different ones out there.
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Panspermia Microbiology in Essex and Melbec Microbiology in Lancashire are both really good from personal experience. I believe they both do their testing onsite.
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I like sodium benzoate and potassium sorbate (around 0.4% and 0.2% respectively) - downside is you have to ensure a low pH (4.5-5)
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Hi @RickS
Your problem lies in the fact that you’re using Xanthan gum to thicken - this gives pseudoplastic (shear-thinning) rheology and as such is good at suspending things, including bubbles. Most shampoos on the market are thickened by the addition of electrolytes (usually common salt) to anionic surfactants, which generally gives a Newtonian rheology and as such will allow the bubbles to rise and dissipate, providing the viscosity isn’t so great as to completely overcome the buoyancy of the bubbles.
There’s two ways to overcome this problem - firstly you could manufacture your shampoo under a partial vacuum, which is very costly in terms of setup, or you could change the formulation to something similar to the above.
Actually there’s a third way - put it in an opaque bottle so no-one can see the bubbles!
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Quite a lot of heavy oils there, I’d be surprised if it doesn’t feel quite greasy. You may want to consider increasing Sweet Almond and dropping the avocado - I’m assuming you’ll want to avoid avoid less “natural” materials like IPM?
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@Perry
I got an email about it, it does look interesting! I take issue with some of their statements about challenge testing though:“Challenge test is required for all cosmetic products with the exception of microbiologically low-risk products, which are the following:
- Products that don’t contain water/have low water activity
- Products with a pH below 3 or above 10
- Products containing more than 20% alcohol
- Products containing raw materials that can create a hostile environment (strong oxidizing agents, polar organic solvents, oxidizing dyes, aluminium chlorohydrate and related salts, propellant gasses etc.)
- Products that are filled in containers at more than 65 degrees Celsius
- Products packaged in pressurized containers, pump dispensers or single-dose units”
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Ah fair enough! Has she specified the Kaolin inclusion level? If not I’d still maybe drop it down a bit, 20% should be more than enough to feel muddy.
No I’d leave emulsifiers in, it’ll probably be quite unpleasant to use without them but add some waxes as well. It might be useful to trial the wax levels without Kaolin to get to a firmish consistency that will suspend particulates.
On a side note, I usually use Polysorbate 60 as the emulsifier for these sorts of products and it works quite well - I don’t think you need to worry about matching the HLB of your oils and emulsifier system as you’re not trying to make a stable emulsion. Something with a higher HLB (like the polysorbates) should interact more freely with the water in the shower when rinsing off. Doesn’t fit very well with your natural looking formulation though!
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@Dr_Sara I totally agree - you see it all the time! SLES-free moisturisers always make me chuckle.
I believe it’s actually common practice amongst major brands (some of them, at least) to make totally unsubstantiated claims that they know are illegal. One of their competitors will challenge it after so long and they’ll say “Oh, very sorry, we’ll amend that as soon as possible but it’ll take at least a year to arrange new packaging” and just repeat the cycle.
Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be any appetite amongst regulatory bodies to actually tackle these issues.
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Can you provide % inclusion levels for your materials? It’s hard to diagnose otherwise
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Personally I’d scrap out the clay totally, and thicken with some waxes - beeswax would be ideal, 4-8% probably, and make up the rest with more oils. Clays can be so variable, and certainly from my experience of kaolin don’t play nicely in anhydrous systems.
Having said that, I”m guessing that the phase separation you’re seeing is the solids sinking to the bottom and an oil phase on top? If that’s the case you could probably get away with just thickening the formulation as is with a touch of high-melting point wax to the point where the viscosity is sufficient to overcome the effect of gravity - at least for an acceptable amount of time. Change in odour could be rancidity, could be the Kaolin.
