Making Lye (Part 2)

Here we are four days later since our first post here in: Making Lye (Part 1) and it is time to check on our lye water that has been soaking (leaching) in our fireplace ashes. The rainwater we poured on top of the ashes has been soaking for about four days and it is time to drain it out and test it to determine if it is strong enough for soap making.  I cut the bottom out of a gallon sized vinegar jug in order to make a funnel. Then I cut an old T-shirt up and placed it inside the homemade funnel to use as a filter. Then I pulled the plug.

Pullin' the plug

I prepared myself for a rush of water mixed with ashes, but I was wrong.  Only a drip, drip, drip of tea-colored lye water emerged and I realized that this was going to be a multi-day affair. The lye water was filtering through the ashes making the progress slow, but in the process making the liquid almost clear.

Drip, drip, drip...

Since I couldn't hold the funnel for days, I did the next best thing.  I put the T-shirt filter over the clean bucket, tilted the top molasses bucket full of ashes and rainwater at an angle to speed up the dripping and just left it there for a few days to completely drip out.  The T-shirt filter caught the minimal amount of ashes that drained through the plug.

Lye dripping out slowly (Patience is a virtue!)

Since we have friends and neighbors coming to get milk and eggs, we wanted to be sure that no one touched the liquid since it is caustic and will burn you.  Tricia made a warning sign to let them know to be careful around it.  I need to correct the sign to read that it is caustic.  Lye is alkaline, the opposite of acidic, and is caustic, meaning it will cause chemical burns.

I ain't gonna lye - this liquid will burn you!

Finally the bucket stopped dripping.  The result was a somewhat clear liquid, about the color of iced tea, and you could see the bottom of the bucket.  I didn't measure it, but I assume that we yielded a little more than a couple gallons of lye water.

Lye water

I learned by checking several places on the Internet that for regular soap making (which is our goal), the way you test the strength of the lye is by putting a potato or an egg in the lye.  If either one has a quarter-sized area to float above the liquid level, the strength is perfect for soap making.  Lye gets stronger each time you leach it.  As you can see the potato floated, but NOT above the level of the liquid.  That tells us that it is not quite ready yet.  It needs to get stronger so we'll soak it again.  We want to be sure and throw this potato away!!

Potato floating in the lye - Not quite strong enough yet.

So I put the rubber plug back into the big bucket of ashes and poured the lye water back into it.  We'll let it leach for another 3 or 4 days, drain it again and then check the strength again with another potato or egg.

Same song, second verse

The clear lye water quickly became "muddy" again when mixed with the ashes.  One side note:  I wore gloves handling the lye water, but when the test showed it wasn't strong enough, I took them off and picked up the T-shirt wet with lye with my bare hands.  I could instantly feel the burn on my fingers!  I will be more careful next time.  I'm okay, but it taught me to not let my guard down.  It is not called CAUSTIC by mistake.

Check back with us next week where we'll post Part 3 in our Lye Making Experiment where we'll test the strength of the lye again.