That's right: a soapmaker. As in 'one who makes soap'.
As many of you know I have really sensitive and dry skin. This led me down a path several years ago that resulted in making my own soap. Not the stuff you buy to melt-down and mold, I'm talking full-on face protection while you mix the lye, add some fat, and eventually cut into slabs soap. It's actually quite enjoyable, a nice blend of exact science and crafty creativity (kinda like baking).
FYI, for the curious fruggie, you can make basic soap for about $1.50 per pound, perhaps $2 if you decide to make it smell pretty. It is cheaper to buy Ivory soap when you find a coupon or a good sale, BUT Ivory dries my skin out. Plus, for the veggies and vegans out there, Ivory is made from animal products (sodium tallowate = soap made from beef fat, which is actually a very good fat for making soap).
I'm still hoarding my last batch of soap, I make some every 2 years or so b/c it is a PITA to clean up afterwards. You'd think a big batch of soaping stuff would be easy to clean, right? WRONG: the stuff in the pot isn't soap yet, it's just a hot greasy caustic mess that'll burn you if you're not careful!
But, I digress.
DH and I replaced the kitchen drain pipe Friday evening. Yes, the one that was leaking like a seive. The pipe we took out was 2.5" cast iron and likely original to the house. It was so badly deteriorated that, when we tried to snap it with the specially rented pipe cutter, one part of the cast iron shattered. Turns out we could slice the thing off using our Saws-All and didn't have to have the rental equipment after all. Oh well...
Anyways, we got the section off, and I found myself staring into the pipe. Like a bad car-wreck, I couldn't tear my eyes away. Inside the 2.5" pipe was maybe 1" of space for the drain water. The rest of the pipe looked like it was filled with red clay.
Of course, it wasn't clay. It was 80 years worth of EWWWWWWWWWW!!!! Think of the stuff that gets poured down your kitchen sink. Imagine 80 years worth of it. That's what was inside the pipe. It looked like red clay because it had been tinted by the rust from the pipe. In retrospect, that was probably a good thing otherwise I mighta tossed my cookies.
And this, dear friends, is when my inner soapmaker spoke up about the beauty of drain cleaners.
Sodium hydroxide (lye) + water generates heat (a lot, actually).
Hot water/lye solution + fat = a cascading exothermic chemical reaction called saponification, otherwise known as soapmaking.
The chemical structure of soap gives it a dual nature, a split personality if you will. One side of the molecule is hydrophillic: it loves water and is attracted to it (this comes from the lye used in the process). The other side of the molecule is hydrophobic/lipophillic: it loves fats and is attracted to them (this comes from the fat used in the process). The result is soap's ability to 'cut' grease and increase water's cleaning power.
Putting lye down a drain and flushing it with hot water creates the solution which in turn reacts with a layer of the fatty EWWW lining the pipe turning it into some weird freakish soap (but soap nontheless). Soap + hot water = the ability to dissolve even more of the unreacted fatty EWWW in the pipe.
Moral of the story? Who-ever named 'drain cleaner' must have been a soapmaker!
Replacing the Kitchen Drain: A Soapmaker's Perspective
January 22nd, 2007 at 04:01 pm
January 22nd, 2007 at 04:36 pm 1169483765
January 22nd, 2007 at 04:54 pm 1169484874
January 23rd, 2007 at 04:37 am 1169527039
January 23rd, 2007 at 05:51 am 1169531467
VG-
January 23rd, 2007 at 01:59 pm 1169560744
thanks for the compliment, vizsla! and yes, 'PITA' proves useful in a host of situations. much like TDMI, 'too darn much information'
January 23rd, 2007 at 11:00 pm 1169593207