I used to post quite actively in r/soapmaking since, well, I’m a soap maker.

My wife and I raised the pigs, rendered the lard, and mixed it with other oils and lye to make soap. You know, soap making.

r/soapmaking was filled with people who bought soap that other people made, melted it, mix in perfume and glitter, poured it into moulds, and sold it. I pointed out that they weren’t actually making soap but were doing arts and crafts with soap that other people make.

They set upon my like a bunch of extremist vegans at a BBQ. I said that there wasn’t anything wrong with doing soap arts and crafts but that it wasn’t really soap making since they didn’t actually make soap.

They called me arrogant for not accepting that not making soap was soap making and banned me. I can’t remember whether it was permanent or temporary but I never went back.

  • Maple EngineerOPM
    4•6 months ago

    You’re doing soap arts and crafts and that’s fine. You’re carving soap that someone else made not making soap. It’s like buying a book that someone else wrote, putting a pretty cover on it, and calling yourself an author.

    • Logi
      10•6 months ago

      That’s called book binding. A perfectly respectable craft.

      • Maple EngineerOPM
        3•6 months ago

        So is soap arts and crafts.

        I make soap. I turn an animal into something you can wash yourself with. If you buy the soap that I made you’re not making the soap, I did.

    • SatansMaggotyCumFart
      3•6 months ago

      I melt the shavings down and turn them into new bars so I definitely make soap.

      • Maple EngineerOPM
        2•6 months ago

        What is the saponification number of the oils that you’re using? Are you using NaOH or KOH?

        • SatansMaggotyCumFart
          3•6 months ago

          What is the saponification number of the oils that you’re using

          The animal fat I use sometimes is 195-200.

          Are you using NaOH or KOH

          That depends on the soap that I make but I prefer a soft soap using caustic potash.

          But these days I’m content with carving the soap, it’s not that easy to get chemicals where I’m living.

          • Maple EngineerOPM
            2•6 months ago

            That’s soap making.

            I have six 40 kg bags of KOH in my storage building that I was given by a lab that was shutting down in a small city near where I live. I have the advantage of having studied chemistry in university so I speak the language and they trusted me. I found when I got home that they had slipped a number of bottles of chemicals that I didn’t ask about into my truck.

            • SatansMaggotyCumFart
              3•6 months ago

              Yeah that’s how I got arrested for methamphetamine production the first time so I hear you.

                  • Maple EngineerOPM
                    2•6 months ago

                    One of the other things that lab gave me was anhydrous, pharmaceutical grade methanol. A 219 L barrel. I’ve been considering doing an tertiary alcohol catalyzed magnesium reduction of the KOH to give me potassium metal. My wife objects.

          • Maple EngineerOPM
            3•6 months ago

            Lye is a natural product. It’s the runoff from water passing through wood ash. When you calculate the saponification properly the lye is completely consumed converting the triglyceride into fatty acid and glycerol. Of course, if you’re old school you can leave some of the lye in and get the real wash your sins away experience.