Make Your Own Foaming Soap

By Miss Cellania in Home & Garden on Jul 1, 2008 at 11:40 pm

I received a bottle of foaming soap as a gift and had wondered if I could refill it, since it measures the proper amount for hand washing so well. A comment at Consumerist led me to an Instructable on exactly this question. Foaming soap costs more than regular liquid soap, but the difference is the container. And the secret is that the foaming soap you pay more for is regular liquid soap that has been watered down! Now I know what to do with all this “bath gel” my family got for Christmas. Link

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Dani
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 12:40 am
I’VE BEEN WONDERING ABOUT THIS FOR A YEAR!

thank you.
Paul D.
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 5:50 am
My family has been doing this for a few months. We were given the foaming soap, but I’m too cheap to buy it. I think liquid soap in general is a rip off (paying for shipping water) but my wife likes it and likes the foaming stuff even more. I’ve found that 2 parts generic liquid hand soap to 1 part water works really well in the dispensers we have.
Lauren
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 8:24 am
I’ve been doing this for a couple of years, and I totally agree that the refills are a ripoff. I used a Dial foamer until the mechanism inside broke, now I’ve got a Dawn foamer that seems quite sturdy. My soap-to-water ratio is even lower. Fill the container with warm water, add a generous squirt of soap, cap & shake.
Dayna
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 8:38 am
I just started doing this too, since my whole family decided i needed bath stuff for Christmas last year ( i really dont have a BO problem, so i was just a touch offended) It is so easy and completely worth the 5 mins it takes to fill up the container.
Jim
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 9:27 am
I’ve been doing this for a few years from the instructions I got at Cockeyed.com. Eventually the dispensers may not function (they can “lock” and be useless) but still, a few years is good!
Neatoramawontsendmeapassword
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 11:27 am
I’ve been doing this for a while. I just refilled my soap foamer this morning, actually. One squirt of soap (plus water) makes a whole bottle. Pretty economical!
Emily M
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 2:01 pm
My family and i used to have a special pump like that to make your own foaming soap before I ever saw them sold in stores.
Peeves
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 4:09 pm
One squirt of soap in an entire bottle? Makes me realize what foam actually is..a weak byproduct..is it really cleaning your hands? (I’ve just used it once..didn’t seem strong enough)
Lionheart
Jul 2nd, 2008 at 8:16 pm
That´s very useful. I have never thought about it.
Neatoramawontsendmeapassword
Jul 4th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
@ Peeves:

Define “strong enough”. You’re not actually supposed to strip the skin off your hands every time you wash them, you know.

The diluted foam is probably just as strong as using a bar of soap and water. Unless you like to lather up until your hands are buried in four-inch-thick suds.
gatto grande
Oct 5th, 2008 at 11:43 pm
I saw on other sites the common ratio is 1:4.It will also depend on how soft your water is. I dilute my soap with boiled (cooled) water, or filtered (this way i hope i get a ‘cleaner’ soap).
Also, when i noticed that my foam dispenser was not pumping well or hardly, i almost threw it away. But then i just decided to open up the bottle, remove the tube (it’s easily removable) from the main ‘mechanism’ (for the luck of a better word), and wash it well. I think, in my case, the pumping was suffering not because of soap build-up, as i suspected originally, but because somehow the water got collected inside the pump and affected the pumping. At first i didn’t know how to get rid of the water (i couldn’t open the pump further), then i just turned the pump upside down and tried to pump it empty. It worked! The water came out and when put all part back together, my foam dispenser was good as new!

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