Gen 2 Development: Bar 1, Part 2 (Mostly Done!)

The first prototype of Gen 2 is ready!

In our last chapter, we had a problem with the actual consistency of the soap.  That has been resolved with some further formula tweaks.  the resulting bar is now nice and solid, just how I want it to be.  It is slightly more sticky when dry than my usual formula, but when wet its just perfect.

The aroma was also not quite dialed in, though I had a solid base.  I obtained three melon scents, one each of watermelon, honeydew and cantaloupe. 

I had to go to two different vendors, as my preferred go-to, weirdly enough, didn't have straight cantaloupe.  As it turns out, my go-to kinda let me down on this particular outing.  The "honeydew" does not smell like any sort of melon I recognize, lets alone a honeydew melon.  The watermelon smelled like watermelon bubblegum:  Not a bad smell, mind you, but I wanted something more natural.  As it turns out that vendor has both "Natural Watermelon" and "Wild Watermelon," but the "Natural" does not show up in search results for "watermelon" on their site, so I opted for "Wild."   Eh, I'll take part of the blame on that one.

So that left me with the cantaloupe by default, because it smelled both nice and accurate.  I used less mint and added in the cantaloupe, and at first I thought the mint was overriding everything, but my partner assured me I had just gone a bit noseblind, and she was right:  When I came back to what I had mixed up the next day it seemed like I had a pretty good combo on my hands.  It has been shower-tested:  Sometimes certain aspects of a scent will blossom, or shift, once exposed to water, but this one stayed the course.

I added an orange colorant to the batch - No unexpected shifts there either.  Its lighter orange color than what I'm using for Unregistered HyperOrange 2, so its visually distinctive.

To do:

I need to get the prototype to my vtuber partner for approval!

I obtained the molds for the shape that will go into the middle of the final product.  I haven't tested them out yet, because I needed to nail the consistency issue down first to get accurate results.  I don't anticipate any issues with the shape or the second color.