**How is it that mixing standard hand soaps results in a hand soap that no longer soaps up? It becomes watery and loses its sudsing ability. I have seen this on several occasions. Most lately with Walmart brand hand soap mango and coconut water with Dial brand mango and coconut water. Added Dial to two hand soap dispensers that both had a couple tablespoons of soap left in the bottom. It is like the soaps cancel each other out.**
In: Chemistry
Liquid soaps are liquid crystals. This means they are in a delicate balance to make a beautiful soap with great feel. Add a little water or salt or perfume and you can destroy that balance.
A common way to disturb the balance is to turn the liquid crystal into a solution… which thins out the resulting product to “liquidy” or water thin.
Sudsing has nothing to do with cleaning ability. Mixed soaps will perform fine. Suds are formed when that perfect balance of chemistry stabilizes air bubbles. It’s a rare thing and hard to get, especially with synthetic soaps. This is a premium feature you normally pay extra for. Soaps don’t commonly suds up.
It’s surprising that small changes make big differences. Liquid soap chemistry is delicate. In this case, I am not oversimplifying by saying it all depends on what you are mixing.
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