OldPerry
Forum Replies Created
-
You’ll sometimes see a formula with the letters ‘qs’ for water which just means “add enough water to make the formula total equal 100%”
Incidentally, if you are making a formula where 0.75% water would make a difference in the outcome, that’s not a particularly robust formula. The amount of ingredients will easily vary from a range of +/- 1% on many production batches.
-
You can also search a site like https://www.upwork.com/
-
There’s no control. This is the same problem with the Darby research on finding parabens in breast cancer tissue. That they found parabens is not surprising since it’s a food preservative & urine is where the body gets rid of waste.
This study does nothing to answer the implied question “Are parabens causing infertility?”
Although I suppose the data does support the conclusion that the most commonly used paraben, Methylparaben, is not causing infertility.
It also hasn’t been replicated.
-
What makes you think simple soap making is safe? When no scientific proof is required to convince scientifically illiterate juries of a guilty verdict, every product is at risk.
-
@Microformulation - Thanks for the link. I didn’t know that forum archive was still available.
-
Stearamidopropyldimethylamine in a shampoo? I’ve used it in a conditioner but not a shampoo.
-
You might try Colin - colinsbeautypages.co.uk
-
Why don’t you just keep the oil phase on the hot plate but turn down the heat to warm?
I would suggest using a water bath for both. You heat up the water and put the oil phase beaker in that. You could do the same with the water phase. Then you will have more control over the temperature.
-
You might find this post about cosmetic lab mixers helpful.
-
Can’t your supplier provide a name?
I searched the PCPC Buyer’s Guide but didn’t find that exact compound.
Perhaps this list of front matter from the latest INCI Dictionary which explains how names are created will help.
-
That really depends on the ingredients you are using for the lip gloss. What are your ingredients?
-
I’m not sure how this is even a story. All of the shampoos fall within the safety limits set by the China FDA. What am I missing?
-
@Persona - I think you are misunderstanding the term “glycols”. There are potentially tens of thousands of ingredients that could be considered glycols. Glycol just means it contains at least two -OH groups attached to different carbon atoms.
So, Ethylene Glycol, Propylene Glycol and Polyethylene Glycol are all glycols but they do not chemically behave the same. It’s a bit like saying bananas and oranges are the same because they are fruits.
Ethylene glycol can be used to denature specific proteins but not keratin. Propylene glycol might help denature DNA under certain circumstances.
But when used in skin care “glycols” are not skin protein denaturants. Instead they are good moisturizing ingredients.
-
@DeshiCrew - You can find chemists here.
Or you can find other chemists here. -
Yeah, I just found out the site charges $30 a month per user. I can’t see this being of much value for me since UL Prospector is free and contains all the information I typically would need.
-
Ethanol incorporated into a formula is not proven to dry out the skin.
Here is a relevant discussion. https://chemistscorner.com/does-alcohol-cause-skin-irritation/
-
What is AZP-940? I’m guessing Carbomer?
what is the active AP ingredient?
Since there is no preservative, yes a high level of alcohol is needed.
-
False. They are humectants. They help moisturize skin. They don’t cause wrinkles
-
You can also do tress combing and feel tests on real human hair tresses.
-
@SheilaInBoston - Interesting question.
No, I do not think the cosmetic industry or my profession is a fraud.
Cosmetic products work. They solve people’s problems. They make people happy. How could that possibly be bad?
Unfortunately, the technology can’t solve many of the consumers most pressing problems and companies don’t have a way to differentiate their products from the standpoint of technology.
So for various reasons most consumers need a story. Purchasing products that work is just not a compelling enough reason to buy products. These stories will invariably focus on some technology that has a hint of effectiveness. It also gives a company a way to stand apart from the crowd. If everyone can make a product just as good as yours, you need to find some way to stand out.
Of course, this desire to stand out has led many cosmetic companies to over promise, mislead their customers, unnecessarily scare consumers, and propagate false information.
On my other website The Beauty Brains I attempt to arm consumers with information they can use to see through this marketing BS and to develop a reasonable view of what products can do.
Cosmetics work (for what they can do). And they make people happy. I think that’s a good thing.
But it’s somewhat unfortunate that consumers need stories & marketers are all too ready to stretch the truth to create those stories that get people to buy products.
The bottom line is that as a scientist I think it is important to not fool yourself. If something works, we should be able to prove it. If it doesn’t, we should be able to admit that. And if we don’t know, we should be able to say that too. This doesn’t always line up with what the marketing department of your company would want.
-
@SheilaInBoston - it would be nice to have but I doubt anyone could make much money off it. It would also be a bit complicated by the fact that not everyone agrees with what “truth” means when it comes to ingredients.
For example, I’m of the opinion that very few natural (and synthetic) ingredients work, at least to a degree that any consumer would notice. Certainly, many companies have devised experiments that do demonstrate a theoretical effect on lab samples, but few studies are published reflecting real-life conditions that a consumer would experience. Under these conditions, I doubt you can show much effect of anything. However, I can be convinced.
To convince me, I would like to see double-blind, placebo controlled, in-use data on a large enough group of subjects to get statistically significant effects. For the vast majority of ingredients these studies do not exist. I am not convinced by anecdotal evidence or even by my own personal experience. It’s just too easy to fool oneself.
However, as you can see in this discussion thread, there are formulators who find different standards of evidence convincing. @Belassi & @DRBOB@VERDIENT.BIZ believe that certain polypeptides have a great effect. I’m a bit more skeptical.
So, in putting together such a database you would have to decide whose opinion of an ingredient’s effectiveness would be include. You’d have to figure out what level of proof is acceptable. The differences in these choices is why you find such different advice about ingredients & also why there is no one definitive source of information.
-
You can assume claims about natural ingredients are probably not true. In fact, any claim about any ingredient that sounds impressive is probably not entirely true.
You also have to learn how to read claims. The phrase “help boost…” can mean pretty much anything, so it really means nothing.
The most trustworthy sources are the ones from people who are
1. Not trying to sell you a product with the ingredient
2. Not trying to sell you the ingredient
3. Not trying to scare you & convince you to donate to their causeIncidentally, no it is not true that gardenia stem cells will have some kind of noticeable benefit on skin.
-
Usually, you neutralize Carbomer with a 1:1 ratio of TEA:Carbomer. But it really depends on the pH of your formula & other ingredients.