How to increase TFM IN SOAP

by Nesrine Tesseini
(Lebanon)

I want to ask you how to increase the amount of TFM in soap?

So I'll tell you the formula of our soap then you can help me to make it perfect.

First to make 50kg of soap we put:
15 kilo of water
25 kilo of oil

as a result we obtain TFM amount btween 55 and 65
but the standard of TFM should be more than 74%
therefore I tried to increase the amount of TFM by reducing water to 5 kilos as a result the TFM reached 71%

So do you have any idea how to reach a high standard of TFM??
Thanks for help

Answer:

To be honest, TFM isn't something I have considered or even knew about until the first person asked me about it recently.

For those of you who are wondering what TFM stands for, here is a description I found.

TFM% = Total Fatty Matter - a method of grading soap. If the TFM% is over 80% it is said to be a Grade 1 soap and if it is between 80 - 65% it is said to be Grade 2.


One thing to consider is that, I believe, the TFM is calculated after the soap is made and not by the recipe used. The process consists of decomposing a soap sample to divide the soaps components and to calculate the TFM.

Also, handmade soap will contain a lot more water in it at the start of the soap making process compared to the final product at the end of the cure period when the water has long evaporated out of the soap.

I'm not sure this is a good system to grade handmade soaps with since commercial soap is made so differently and contains much less water in it. Sure the TFM system will determine which soap has more fats/oils in it by weight but it does not determine the quality of those oils or of the other ingredients. Consider all of the wonderful 'goodies' we add to our soaps to make them so very extra special. These will also bring down the TFM of a soap.

To answer your question about how to increase the TFM of the soap, I believe you are probably right to try and reduce the water amount since basically you are trying to increase the ratio of oils to the other ingredients in the recipe.

Unfortunately, I can't really help you out any more than that since this question involves a more advanced level of chemistry knowledge than I have.

Cathy