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Saponification: making soap template

Premium template. Preview and edit it free in MolDraw; downloading and exporting it is part of MolDraw Pro.

GCSE / high school / CBSE / Abitur: vegetable oil and NaOH solution heated and stirred in a beaker on a tripod and gauze, then the soap salted out with saturated NaCl solution and filtered.

What the template shows

Boil a fat or oil with sodium hydroxide, then salt out the soap
Stir all the time; add water as it boils away
Oil + NaOH(aq)
e.g. 10 cm³ vegetable oil and 20 cm³ 20% NaOH; heat gently for 15–20 min until no oil layer is left
Hot alkali spits: goggles. If ethanol is added to help mixing, use a water bath or hotplate, not a flame
Salting out
Pour into saturated NaCl solution: the soap separates as curds on top. Filter, wash with a little cold water
Glycerol stays in solution
Fat + 3NaOH → glycerol + 3 RCOO⁻Na⁺ (soap). The soap is still alkaline: do not use it on skin
Reaction setup

Drawn with 13 shapes – every one editable in MolDraw.

Sources

How to use this template

Press Edit in MolDraw. The template opens on the canvas of the free MolDraw editor.
Change anything: move structures, edit atoms and labels, recolour highlights or delete what you do not need.
Add your own structures, arrows and text next to it, or combine several templates on one page.
Export the drawing as PNG, SVG or PDF for slides, worksheets, theses and papers.

Frequently asked questions

Is the Saponification: making soap template free?

You can preview the Saponification: making soap template here and open and edit it in MolDraw for free. Downloading or exporting it is part of MolDraw Pro, together with the other premium templates.

Can I edit the Saponification: making soap template?

Yes. It opens as an ordinary MolDraw drawing, so every structure, arrow, label and colour can be changed, and you can add your own content around it.

Is the chemistry checked?

Every structure is checked with RDKit and every curly arrow passes MolDraw’s electron-flow audit. The sources used are listed on this page.

Can I edit the glassware?

Yes. Every piece of glassware is a MolDraw apparatus object: move, resize, recolour the liquid or swap a piece and the joints stay connected.