Melting down soap scraps

This is something I did a while back, and then waited to see what the final result looked like, before reporting on it.

I used to save scraps of bar soap for making homemade laundry soap, and after we switched to store-bought laundry detergent--for the sake of our landlord's front-loading washer--I kept on saving them.

Finally I had enough scraps to melt down and make bars of soap. The scraps were an eclectic mix, everything from motel soaps to fancy-shmancy handmade soap.

I loaded them into the old pan that I used for making laundry soap, and started heating them up.

The first problem I encountered was that most of these quite old, quite dry scraps of soap would not melt, even over high heat.

Solution:  add some water. It took more water than I expected, and I knew I was going to end up with melted soap with way too much water in it.

Even with the water, the soap was melting very slowly, so I turned up the heat a bit.

Next problem:  the water/soap mixture started boiling, so now I had melted soap with too much water and too much air in it. The scraps did finally melt...mostly.

I dumped it all into a plastic dishpan (for a mold), and let it cool down.

When cool, I cut it into bars...it was still quite gooey.

I decided to put them up somewhere and let them dry out for a few months.

I checked after a month or two, and they were coming along, shrinking and wrinkling quite a bit as they dried.

Now, after a couple more months, they are more or less shriveled down to the consistency of regular soap, and they seem usable.

It is probably possible to re-melt them now and re-pour, and have them come out more nicely, but I am okay with using them as they are.