Carbolic soap

[kelly41]

I recently visited a victorian museum and picked up a bar of traditional carbolic soap, it's amazing nothing has ever removed ink stains from my fingers like this does so thought I'd share  for anyone that may want to try it 

[bunnspecial]

"Cabolic soap" contains carbolic acid, better known now as phenol. That's the old fungicide used in inks, and one of the things responsible for the "inky smell" of old inks.

 

I'm not surprised that it removes ink for a couple of reasons. For one, we know it plays nice in solution with dyes, and I'd not be surprised if a solution of phenol in water was effective at removing ink. For another, phenols as a whole are mildly irritating to your skin and can cause dead skin cells to fall off-it could conceivably be that you're knocking off the skin that the ink was on.

[InesF]

31 minutes ago, bunnspecial said:

For another, phenols as a whole are mildly irritating to your skin and can cause dead skin cells to fall off-it could conceivably be that you're knocking off the skin that the ink was on.

👏

 

Carbolic soap was used as disinfectant in hospitals. Very effective! Later phenol was classified cancerogenous.

@kelly41: you got a nice piece of history - keep it, but be careful!

[Fermata]

I have heard the name but that is all, is it okay to use on  your hands and body?

 

One manufacturer describes it as A no-nonsense multi purpose soap, which at the time was used for cleaning virtually anything. Personal use, bathrooms, sinks, floors, garage.

 

You will understand that I don't want to lose my allure.

[kelly41]

I think the carbolic soap we get now has or very low levels compared to what it did have as you can actually buy quite a few versions in supermarkets here in the UK and it doesn't come with any warning labels, in fact it was recommended by our GP for my sons eczema 

You can buy loads of different types at places like this

https://carbolicsoap.com the piece I got was a block like the one here so should last ages 

[kelly41]

1 hour ago, bunnspecial said:

"Cabolic soap" contains carbolic acid, better known now as phenol. That's the old fungicide used in inks, and one of the things responsible for the "inky smell" of old inks.

 

I'm not surprised that it removes ink for a couple of reasons. For one, we know it plays nice in solution with dyes, and I'd not be surprised if a solution of phenol in water was effective at removing ink. For another, phenols as a whole are mildly irritating to your skin and can cause dead skin cells to fall off-it could conceivably be that you're knocking off the skin that the ink was on.

That would explain the doctor suggesting it for my sons eczema it does leave your hands feeling very slippy but strangely very moisturised too. I think the levels used now are very low as it doesn't carry any warning labels and doesn't have a strong smell like I've heard the victorian version did. 

It's amazing stuff as some of my inks have had me scrubbing my skin raw to remove but it all comes off with a quick hand wash with this 

[bunnspecial]

1 hour ago, InesF said:

👏

 

Carbolic soap was used as disinfectant in hospitals. Very effective! Later phenol was classified cancerogenous.

@kelly41: you got a nice piece of history - keep it, but be careful!

 

At high enough doses. In the US Chloroseptic throat spray still contains a small amount of it.

 

[bunnspecial]

10 minutes ago, kelly41 said:

That would explain the doctor suggesting it for my sons eczema it does leave your hands feeling very slippy but strangely very moisturised too. I think the levels used now are very low as it doesn't carry any warning labels and doesn't have a strong smell like I've heard the victorian version did. 

It's amazing stuff as some of my inks have had me scrubbing my skin raw to remove but it all comes off with a quick hand wash with this 

 

Little side note on that specifically-

 

One of the oldest know painkillers is salicylic acid, which occurs naturally in willow bark among other places.

 

Salicylic acid, however, contains a phenol group(specifically it's a phenol ortho to a carboxylic acid) and consequently is very irritating to things like your stomach and esophogous.

 

It was figured out that if the Phenol group was "protected" by reacting with acetic acid(or rather acetic anhydride for a more efficient reaction) to form an ester, the painkilling effects and all the other good things remained but it was much less irritating. This became one of the earliest synthetic drugs, known as Acetylsalicylic Acid(ASA), or more often as Aspirin.

 

Salicylic acid, however, is still used in some over the counter skin treatments including for eczema(and acne).

 

One of my long-standing experiments I have my students do is synthesize aspirin from salicylic acid and acetic anhydride-the students like it a lot and it's some good chemistry!

[kelly41]

2 hours ago, bunnspecial said:

 

One of my long-standing experiments I have my students do is synthesize aspirin from salicylic acid and acetic anhydride-the students like it a lot and it's some good chemistry!

I remember doing that one at college but i went on to do biology for my degree

[wallylynn]

On 11/4/2021 at 1:32 PM, kelly41 said:

I remember doing that one at college but i went on to do biology for my degree

I was jealous that the Chem majors got to do that, but not the rest of us with regular Chem class

[kelly41]

3 hours ago, wallylynn said:

I was jealous that the Chem majors got to do that, but not the rest of us with regular Chem class

I love all the names you have that side of the pond for different stages of education but they still confuse me

 

We have

Primary school age 5 till 11

Secondary school 11 till 16

College 16 till 18

University 18+

then we have further education with

Masters degree

PhD 

 

[bunnspecial]

So, my curiosity got the better of me and I ordered a bar of carbolic soap from-where else-Amazon.

 

I've tried it for ink removal twice. The first was an unintentional spill when rehydrating a Penman Sapphire cartridge. It sort of worked, but my old go-to of Lava Soap(which is just abrading the skin that the ink is on) worked better.

 

Today it was Waterman Blue from playing around with an old Waterman Safety. Sure enough, off it came easy as anything...

[kelly41]

4 hours ago, bunnspecial said:

So, my curiosity got the better of me and I ordered a bar of carbolic soap from-where else-Amazon.

 

I've tried it for ink removal twice. The first was an unintentional spill when rehydrating a Penman Sapphire cartridge. It sort of worked, but my old go-to of Lava Soap(which is just abrading the skin that the ink is on) worked better.

 

Today it was Waterman Blue from playing around with an old Waterman Safety. Sure enough, off it came easy as anything...

I'm glad it worked for you, I've not tried lava soap, not sure it would be suitable for eczema prone skin but may have to try. There's different strengths I found, some are sold freely in the UK and some are only available in th EU I got a couple of bars of redbouy brand which is higher strength and according to my mum smells like the real stuff lol

[wallylynn]

On 11/7/2021 at 3:28 AM, kelly41 said:

I love all the names you have that side of the pond for different stages of education but they still confuse me

 

We have

Primary school age 5 till 11

Secondary school 11 till 16

College 16 till 18

University 18+

then we have further education with

Masters degree

PhD 

 

My locale splits 5-18 (12-13 years of school) into elementary - junior high - high schools.  Sometimes I hear them as grade-middle-high. Rarely primary-secondary.

 

Here, college - university seems to depend on the size of the institution not the level. Often individual colleges as part of an umbrella university organization.

[bunnspecial]

1 hour ago, wallylynn said:

My locale splits 5-18 (12-13 years of school) into elementary - junior high - high schools.  Sometimes I hear them as grade-middle-high. Rarely primary-secondary.

 

Here, college - university seems to depend on the size of the institution not the level. Often individual colleges as part of an umbrella university organization.

 

It's not necessarily a specific size, but rather how the school is organized.

 

I went to undergraduate at a "College." It did not offer graduate degrees, and every major/course of studies had the same core general education requirements.

 

Generally a University is sub-divided into "colleges" that each set their own standards for graduates. Where I went to graduate school, we had a College of Arts and Sciences(what I fell under, and the largest college), College of Business, College of Education, College of Engineering, College of Medicine, College of Dentistry, and I'm sure I'm forgetting a bunch of others.

 

Going back to my undergraduate college, one of our in-state "competitor" schools(similar size, mission, etc) added a college of pharmacy and "upgraded" themselves to a University.

[kelly41]

1 hour ago, wallylynn said:

My locale splits 5-18 (12-13 years of school) into elementary - junior high - high schools.  Sometimes I hear them as grade-middle-high. Rarely primary-secondary.

 

Here, college - university seems to depend on the size of the institution not the level. Often individual colleges as part of an umbrella university organization.

All sounds very confusing to me 😃

[Kari Homan Shannon]

On 11/4/2021 at 12:32 PM, kelly41 said:

I remember doing that one at college but i went on to do biology for my degree

 

I wish I had a more math-ier brain.... I remember taking white powder, adding heat and it turning blue, but I didn't understand what or why.  I passed that class on prayers and pleading and never took another chemistry class again.... 

 

 

[inkstainedruth]

If my high school chemistry class had done cool things like play with how to make inks and what ones were acidic vs. alkaline, I might have paid a LOT more attention....

Although I did go to a very amusing thing at the Science Museum in Columbus, OH a number of years ago on the chemistry of fireworks.  It was really designed for kids, but was quite entertaining for adults too.  Some woman dressed up as a mad scientist was explaining how you got the different colors and IIRC the sounds of the booms (and possibly even the ones that make whistling noises as they explode.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth