Soap can be prepared by heating fat or oil together with alkali through the saponification process
The saponification process is a hydrolysis process of oil or fat by alkali
The vegetable oil that is usually used to manufacture soap is palm oil, coconut oil and olive oil
The manufacturing of soap can be divided into two steps, that is
Step 1
* The two parts of the oil or fat molecule are separated by heating
the oil with alkaline solution through the hydrolysis process.
In this process, the oil or fat molecule is broken up into fatty acid
and glycerol by water in the presence of alkali which acts as a catalyst
Step 2
*The fatty acid that is released in step 1 reacts with
alkali to form sodium salt fatty acid which is soap
The type of soap that is produced depends on the type of fatty acid and alkali that is used
The soap that is produced can be precipitated out from the mixture by adding table salt that is sodium choride
Sodium chloride is added to reduce the solubility of soap in water and causes the soap to be separated from the solution
The soap that is produced is filtered, purified and added with additives such as biological enzymes, whitening agents, antiseptics, perfumes and colouring
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