The home of SwiftCraftyMonkey! Join Susan as she obsesses about cosmetic chemistry and other things (some possibly related to monkeys). Often strange, occasionally useful, and always worth a stop as a point of interest on your journey through the Intertron.
Jen from Lotioncrafter was kind enough to send me some sodium phytate to play with over the summer. Sodium phytate is a water soluble chelating ingredient we can add to our products at 0.05% to 0.5% to bind with metal ions to keep the ingredients from reacting with them. These metal ions can precipitate in…...
As we meet the preservatives in the Euxyl series, this PDF might come in handy… Euxyl K903 (INCI: Benzyl alcohol (and) benzoic acid (and) dihydroacetic acid) is a broad spectrum preservative that can be used in products that contain water, such as surfactant blends and emulsions. It’s considered naturally compliant. Benzyl alcohol is a polar molecule…...
Euxyl K 900 (INCI: Benzyl Alcohol (and) Ethylhexylglycerin) is considered by the company to be a strong broad spectrum preservative. “euxyl® K 900 is a liquid cosmetic preservative based on benzyl alcohol and ethylhexylglycerin. The addition of ethylhexylglycerin affects the interfacial tension at the cell membrane of micro-organisms, improving the preservative activity of benzyl alcohol…....
You might see this ingredient in preservatives like Euxyl® K900 and Euxyl® PE 9010, so what’s it all about then? Ethylhexylglycerin is an alkyl glycerol ether we can use to boost the preserving power of ingredients like phenoxyethanol, methylparaben, and methylisothiazolinone, and works as an effective deodorant, inhibiting the growth of bacteria that might cause body odour…....
In the June Q&A, smc asked, Preservatives for liquid soap. I’m playing with liquid soap make, and due to the high percentage of water I’ll need a preservative. What preservatives work well in a high pH environment and doesn’t have a horrible scent? Thanks. As a quick note before we start, I have pages where…...
Thanks for joining me for this aside on the idea of a product that contains water, like a lotion, can be “self-preserving”. There’s a post on Lush’s site – A beginners’ guide to self-preserving – that we’ll get to shortly, but first, we need to take a look at the idea of hurdle technology, “a term used…...
We need to talk about a preservatives for a bit for both the Tarte Frxxxtion stick duplication and in general. When we’re formulating, we need to evaluate every product to see which preservative will work best with it. In most of the formulas I make, I use Germall Plus liquid because it works with the…...
As I mentioned, I have some new preservatives to share with you. Here’s the other one! From TKB Trading: “Cap 2 and Cap 5 are both broad spectrum preservatives. Cap 5 is more effective against yeast and mold since it contains sodium sorbate but its optimized pH range is 3-7. Cap 5 is soluble in…...
I bought two preservatives from TKB Trading – Preservative Cap-2 and Preservative Cap-5 – as I really wanted to make a lip balm that contains water, and that means I need a preservative. My favourite one, liquid Germall Plus, isn’t suitable for oral or lip care products, so I had to find something new. Let’s take a…...
There was such interest in this post on inactivation of parabens by various ingredients, I wanted to share more with you about preservatives. One of the things on this blog that isn’t so obvious at times is that we need to evaluate each product to see which preservative works best with it, there’s not a…...