Enamel Oil

Making Your Own Lye

Soap is a combination of three ingredients: fat, water and lye. Lye dissolves protein and oily deposits, lending itself to cleaning applications in the home as well as being one of the main ingredients in making soap. Many commercial oven cleaning applications use lye. A powerful wood-stripper, lye will often leave the grain of wood raised. Lye dissolves protein and oil — meaning it can degrade soap and hair — making it useful as a drain cleaner.

Chemically, commercial lye and homemade lye are different. Potassium hydroxide is the lye produced from wood ash. Lye made commercially is sodium hydroxide. These two products are not interchangeable. Read recipes carefully to see which type of lye is used or you could be disappointed with your results.

Homemade lye is best made using ash from hardwoods like maple and oak or by using fruit trees such as apple. Avoid using wood from pine trees or evergreens. A consuming fire with lots of air should be used to produce thin, white papery ash free of charcoal chunks.

You will need enough ashes to fill a lye-safe, waterproof container (non-metal) to within three to four inches of the top rim. This container may be as small as a five gallon plastic container or as large as a wooden barrel.

Two containers (not metal) will be required. One bucket will hold the ash, the other container will catch the runoff. Near the bottom of your ash bucket, fashion a small hole. The opening should be small enough that it can be sealed with a toothpick, a piece of corking or a wooden rod — something which is not metal.

Layer the bottom of the ash container with river gravel. Top this with a four inch layer of packed hay, grass or straw. Stopping three or four inches below the top edge of the bucket, pack the remaining space with ash.

Collect 5 or more gallons of soft water. Having only trace amounts of minerals classifies water as soft. Sources of soft water include water that is specially filtered, from sandstone, peat or lava rock (granite, for example). You could also use distilled water. However, the simplest way to acquire soft water is by collecting rainwater.

Be cognizant that the location of your container should be well away from animals or children that could upend it. Enamel finished pans or glass containers can be used to catch the liquid drained from the ash bucket. Don’t use metal or the lye could burn a hole in it. Find a position for this catch container that is close enough to the ash bucket to prevent unnecessary splashing during drainage.

Lye may cause blindness. If swallowed it can be fatal. It is possible for lye to sear all sorts of surfaces, in particular fats and oils on the skin. The chemical action of lye with fats and oils creates salts which can result in severe burns, permanent injury and scars. A lack of pain may indicate that the burn is so severe as to have caused damage to nerve endings.

It is necessary to take safety precautions before you begin the process. Don’t work in an enclosed area; make sure you have good air exchange. Have contact information for emergency services and poison control on hand. Dress appropriately. Wear rubber gloves (the big yellow kind), long sleeves, have your legs covered and wear safety goggles. Keep vinegar nearby in order to neutralize any skin burns. Do NOT wash with water following contact with this substance as this will merely exacerbate the corrosive affect.

Create a recessed spot in the surface of the ash using a dowel or other wooden rod. Bring 1 gallon of your soft water to a boil. Carefully use the full gallon of boiling water to wet the ash. When the water and ash combine, you will notice some boiling, splashing and spewing. Wait until this simmers down before adding another gallon of soft water. The ashes may settle to a lower level. Add more ash to the container to keep it filled. Add enough soft water to cover the ashes in the bucket. Place a lid over the top of the ash container.

Unstop the drain hole you drilled into the ash container and allow the liquid to runoff into the other container. Draining the ash bucket could take as much as 24 hours.

On the second and third day, pour the water that has runoff of the ashes back through again. Recycling the water through the ashes increases the strength of your lye.

Another option is to leave the container of ash and water sitting. Cover the container and allow the water to sit for about 3 days. Make sure it is in an area where it can’t get spilled. After this time you should drain the bucket.

The resulting liquid is lye water (potassium hydroxide). To check the potency, place a newly laid egg that is still in its shell into the liquid. When the proper strength, your lye solution should cause the egg to float with a portion of its shell exposed with a diameter equaling 2 or 2 1/2 cm’s (about the size of a nickel or a quarter). An egg that sinks means that the lye solution is too weak and won’t work in soap recipes. If the egg bobs on top of the surface, the lye is too strong and needs diluting with more rainwater. Be sure to dispose of the egg after use.

To strengthen weak lye water, heat it to evaporate some of the water. Enamel finished pans are safe for this as long as they are never again utilized in cooking foods. Take care not to scorch lye when heating your solution. You’ve reached the proper potency when a chicken feather held to the heated lye solution begins dissolving. Set the pan of lye water aside to cool.

To avoid splashing later, don’t fill storage jars more than two thirds full of lye water. Store the jars (sealed tightly) in a space that is cool and dark, off-limits to children.

Dig a hole in an out of the way area to dispose of the spent ashes. When the ashes are cool, the hole may be safely filled.

If you wish to dry your lye into potash crystals, place the water into a lye-safe container. You’ll find that glass is a good choice for this project. Left in the sun, uncovered, the water will evaporate and crystals will form. Potash requires the same safety precautions in storage as outlined for the liquid form.

This and other skills are discussed in the new book, The Vision by Debi Pearl, the compelling new novel from international best-selling author who also co-wrote To Train Up A Child and the Good and Evil comic.

Painting Doors and Trim Oil Based Enamel Paint