He took the butter, found two clay pots, and scooped several handfuls of plant ashes into a fire.

Then, put the plant ash into one of the clay pots and fill it with water.

Put the butter in another clay pot without adding water.

Then, both clay pots were placed on the fire to heat.

Li Mengxi and his younger brother waited aside, while the others didn't know what they were doing and looked on curiously.

Not long after, the clay pot and fire pot where the butter was placed was heated, and the butter began to melt.

Within a few minutes, the butter in the jar shrank into a small ball, and a lot of butter boiled out.

Looking back at the plant ash solution, in the jar filled with plant ash and water, the plant ash solution did not even boil, but only one or two small bubbles popped up from time to time.

It seems that some people are waiting and the water is heating too slowly.

Finally, when the plant ash solution started to boil, Li Mengxi picked up the hot clay pot and poured butter into the plant ash solution.

Saponification reaction, what I learned in high school is that oil and fat are added to an alkali solution. Butter is fat, and plant ash solution is an alkali solution. There is no difference.

Pour the butter into the plant ash solution and continue to heat it. The plant ash solution gurgled for a while and began to bubble a lot. The bubbles became more and more and overflowed the jar and flowed out.

Li Mengxi scratched his head, grabbed a handful of bubbles and took a look. Under the firelight, the bubbles in his hand had vaguely colored reflections.

Is this a soap bubble?

In other words, soap is made.

However, when he looked at the clay pot with foam constantly overflowing, Li Mengxi felt that he had forgotten something.

That is, is the saponification reaction an exothermic reaction or an endothermic reaction?

If it is an exothermic reaction, heating will interfere with the reaction process. If it is an endothermic reaction, heating can promote the reaction.

Most of the knowledge in chemistry has been forgotten. It is good enough to remember the difference between endothermic reactions and exothermic reactions.

Because he didn't know whether to heat it to make soap, and because the soap bubbles in the jar overflowed a lot, Li Mengxi had no choice but to take the jar aside and let it cool down before talking.

After a long time, the solution in the jar stopped bubbling.

After a long time, the solution also cooled down.

I picked up a piece of firewood and looked at the jar. I saw a greasy layer of white stuff floating on the cooled solution in the jar.

He picked up a little of the white stuff with his hand and kneaded it a few times. There was some less pure white solid in his hand.

It feels and looks right, solid soap.

Look at the water in the jar again. The water in the jar is slightly blue.

The water is very familiar, much like the color of water after washing hands with soap.

In other words, this is soapy water.

Good guy, the soap was not made, but a pot of soapy water was boiled.

Li Mengxi was helpless.

The first trial of soap production was declared a semi-failure.

The reason why it is a semi-failure is because soapy water also has the ability to remove dirt and cleanse.

When used for medical treatment, when washing the intestines, solid soap must be soaked into soapy water before use.

Therefore, the successful trial production of soapy water fully meets the daily cleaning and medical needs.

"Brick, come here." Li Mengxi called his younger brother to come over.

"Brother, what is this?" Xiao Bian looked at the bubble water in the jar curiously.

I grabbed my little brother's dirty paws and washed them several times with soapy water. The soap was really useful. Little Brick's hands were sticky from playing with fish. After a while, they were clean, and even the old dirt was gone.

After washing it, Xiao Bian's hands were whitened by a degree.

After washing the small bricks, Li Mengxi also used soapy water to wash his own hands.

Looking at Xiao Bian's dirty and half-clean face, he simply rubbed his younger brother's face a few times.

Then, looking at the village heroes who were looking curiously at the side, he said, "Come on, everyone, come and wash up too."

Li Mengxi smiled and invited.

Everyone was reluctant to refuse the kindness, and with some curiosity, they washed their hands with soapy water one after another.

Li Mengxi asked how about soapy water?

Everyone didn't think anything of it, and they all complimented her and said, "It's not bad."

"Have your hands been washed?" Li Mengxi asked.

When everyone looked at it again, they really felt that their hands were so clean after being washed with this greasy water.

The village warriors didn't know the magical power of soap, but Li Mengxi knew very well how important soap was.

Soap is cheap and has strong stain removal capabilities.

Strong decontamination ability means that it can maintain hygiene well.

It can be said that with soap, the hygiene status of ancient armies could be improved several times.

Only washing with water has limited decontamination ability. Bacteria are hidden in the dirt and are not easy to wash off. If you eat with your hands, you will still get sick.

Soap is different. Soap's super decontamination ability can easily remove dirt that is difficult to wash off, and it can also wash away a large number of bacteria.

If the sanitary conditions in the army are improved, the infection rate of diseases and plagues can be reduced.

From the perspective of preventing the plague, it is extremely necessary to promote soap throughout the army, and everyone should bring a piece of soap.

It is impossible to say, if soap had been popularized among Cao Mengde's troops during the Chibi War, then it is very likely that a large-scale plague would not have broken out among Cao Mengde's troops, and Chibi would not have been defeated.

The cost of soap is not high, just oil and a little plant ash are enough.

Plant ash costs nothing, and grease doesn't require much.

The butter boiled from one cow can be used to make thousands of bars of soap. Even if there are ten thousand people in the army, one bar of soap will cost very little.

Besides, a piece of soap can last more than a year and a half.

Not to mention, soap can also be used in intestinal surgeries and is an indispensable medical consumable.

Next, Li Mengxi thought of sulfur soap.

It is said that many skin diseases can be cured by washing them regularly with sulfur soap.

Sulfur has a bactericidal effect, so why not directly cure skin diseases with sulfur?

This is probably because sulfur is too irritating to the skin, and when added to soap, the effect of one plus one is far greater than two.

First of all, soap has strong decontamination ability and can remove surface dirt, making it easier for the sulfur component to act on the affected area.

Furthermore, mixing sulfur into soap is equivalent to diluting the sulfur component to a relatively low concentration, which can stably act on the skin at a low concentration. This is much less harmful than spreading a large handful of sulfur on the skin.

Already.

Thinking of this, Li Mengxi thought that in order to further enhance the sterilizing ability of soap, some sulfur could be added to the soap.

However, the sulfur component may cause additional damage to the intestines, so it is better not to add sulfur to the soap used for colon cleansing.

Thinking of those medicated soaps that advertised all kinds of herbal ingredients in my previous life, I don’t know if the herbs added to the soap are really useful or just a gimmick.

Then find someone who knows how to use herbal medicine to study it.
Chapter completed!