How to make Bon Ami soap cakes

[erik winkler]

At this moment of time in 2010 the Bon Ami soap cakes are getting more scarce every day.
For me as a Dutchman it was even harder to get my hands on some old dusty yellow hard cakes.
Ebay gave me the oppertunity to bid on some of them, but it is getting more difficult and exspensive every time.

Crazy Erik had enough and thought it would not be that difficult to make them myself.
On the Bon Ami website it is pretty clear what the ingredients are:
1. Soap made out of tallow.
2. Feldspar.
3. Some whitening.

So there I was, searching for soap recipies, the differences between the different procedures, fats, and chemicals used in soap making.
After two days i made myself 40 little Bon Ami cakes, they worked great, but were a bit more soapy then the original cakes.
A bit more feldspar and whitening would have done the trick.

But after a night of Letterhead sleep, I thought about the email that Bon Ami sended me a few weeks before:
"We stopped making the cakes, because the man-labour of putting the soapypaste in the molds takes too much time and therefore we ended making these. But we do still sell the soap in its raw form as granulites".

So there i was, I knew how to make the cakes!
Do you know by now?

I bought some Bon Ami soap while I was at Noel & John's superduper workshop (you have to attend or be a loser for ever) and made it into a paste.
Here it goes:
1. Take one can of Bon Ami powder.
2. Put in 150-200ml water.
3. Stir and knead thoroughly untill completely homogeneous.
4. Let is rest for a day and stir/knead again.
5. Put it in a cardboard box, so that the whole mixture fits in nice and tight.
6. The cardboard will suck up the first moisture, and leave it stand for a week or so untill it is hard.
7. When it is hardened, you can carefully tear away the cardboard, so that the cube can harden some more.
8. Let it dry untill it has the right consistancy like the original cakes.
9. Wrap it in clean paper, so not to contaminate it with dirt or loose goldleaves

Erik's Bon Ami cake.jpg (136.31 KiB) Viewed 32700 times

Happy cleaning,
Erik

[DAVE SMITH]

The Dutchman is a genius! these are perfect Erik. will now buy from you...
I have 3 left.....
Nice job
Dave

[Danny Baronian]

Erik,

are you aware that not all powdered Bon Ami is the same?

There was a lawsuit against Bon Ami years ago by a woman that claimed she used powdered Bon Ami to wash her new cars windshield, and that it scratched it. It went to court and the jury awarded her a large sum. Part of the settlement stipulated that Bon Ami either discontinue the powdered Bon Ami, or modify it.

It was modified years ago, but offered in two versions. One modified, the other, the original formula. The labels on both look identical, except the original formula is in a mustard colored can, the modified in a metallic gold can. The gold labeled cans contains what Bon Ami's chemist called a synthetic type of whiting.

How the jury every found merit in the case is amazing. When I had a photo studio, we had a machine that dried our B&W and color prints that was a large, highly polished steel drum made by Kodak. The warranty would be void if anything other than Bon Ami was used to clean the plate, which produced the high gloss on prints.

I've always figured if Bon Ami was specified to clean the drum without damage, it's not going to scratch glass, or much else for that matter.

Danny

[erik winkler]

Yes Danny, I am aware that the label of the cans nowadays contains extra information on the label compared to the original cakes. It could alarm you, but I would just sugest to test it on your glass.
I took my loop magnifier and concluded that it did NOT scratch my glass.
Looks like the degree of warning that Mc Donalds uses on their coffeecups, because they had a lawsuit: "Becarefull, coffee could be hot and therefore burn your skin" Duh...
So sometimes it is overdone, but like with any paint we use here, just test everything before you use it.

Bon Ami powder.jpg (9.04 KiB) Viewed 32649 times

By the way, cut it with an exacto knife just under the lit, there is the cardboard of the can and is easy to cut through.

Erik

[Ron Berlier]

Ahhh, another case where necessity is the mother of invention.

Thanks for sharing your successful outcome.

[Roderick Treece]

After being at it for some 45 years now I've gone through 2 cakes so far. If I get really busy I might go through the last 3 cakes before I die !

[Billie DeBekker]

LOL Roderick.. I know the feeling.. I have 9 Cakes still on my shelf.. Enough for, say 3 lifetimes.

But is nice to see that it can still be made if needed.

[Robare M. Novou]

Erik,

Anybody can make Bon Ami Cake.

My Grandmother used to make Bon Ami Cake...and we would have it every year at Christmas.

It doesn't take a Genius to make Cake.

What does take Genius is making lead paint.

So Erik, get busy making us some lead paint, preferably in Black.

RMN

[erik winkler]

That is no problem Robare, hey you are a bunch of grumpy guys I must say...

Take a sheet of lead, hang it over some 37% hydrochloric and let the hydrochloric fumes attack the lead.
When the surface of the lead turned white, scrape this white dust of and collect.
Repeat this untill you have enough leadoxide.
Powder this thoroughly in a mortar and you have the leadoxide you need for your paint.
Take some japan color and mix, now you have your leadpaint.
Next time do your homework! Happy poisoning

Erik

[Tony Segale]

yeah, i have 3 cakes...

then found 3 more at an estate sale... in the old wrappers...
paid 50cents for all 3

once i build enough stock on hand, I'll make sure to post on the forum my 'overstock cakes'...
should be able to get $5 each by then?

every man has a right to make a profit

[Roderick Treece]

Winky,
I dare you to call me Grumpey to my face. I dare ya to show up in t San Diego. . I'd give ya one of my cakes, FREE if you show up.

[Robare M. Novou]

Erik, you little "Corroder" you! Steel Rusts...Lead Corrodes....and Power Corrupts.

Not to be confused with the mainstream and widely distributed Bon Ami Powder Cleanser, Bon Ami still makes its 1886 formula, originally sold in a bar, but now in powder form. The easy-to-shake can contains gentle feldspar abrasive for polishing and soap for cleaning all hard surfaces. Use to defog windows and mirrors. This is the only Bon Ami powder that is recommended for use on glass and auto glass. NASA even used Cleaning Powder to clean the windows on Skylab. Many allergists recommend original Bon Ami because the natural ingredients contain no detergent, bleach, perfume, or dye.

[erik winkler]

Here an update on the process of making Bon Ami cakes.
I have shown how to "dry" the Bon Ami mixture.
In retrospect this is not the best way.... there is allways some air trapped in the mixture, and when the water evaporates the "cake in the making" is reducing in its volume.
Here a photo of the sinked-in shape:

Crushed Cake.jpg (63.77 KiB) Viewed 32298 times

Therefore I would now suggest to put the wet mixture in a plastic or a tin shape, maybe a bit convex for an easy removal of the cake when dry.
And after one day pressing the cake firmly down to make the cake more compact; a bit like in cheese making....

That's it.

Here we go.jpg (53.24 KiB) Viewed 32298 times

Polish cleaning.jpg (50.28 KiB) Viewed 32296 times

Erik Ami

[Mike Jackson]

Hi Erik,
Good job on your Bon-Ami progress.

Out of curiosity, didn't some people establish they could get wonderfully clean glass by using something simple like whiting and ammonia? Did they do that AFTER scrubbing with Bon-Ami?

And, if you have the right Bon-Ami in the powdered form, can't you just shake some on the wet glass or onto a cotton ball? Does it need to be a cake?

Mike Jackson

[erik winkler]

Well Mike those are exactly the same questions I had.
Eventhough I try to look at all the old and proven techniques with a new perspective, I do not have a proven answer.
At the workshop at Dave Smith's I was thought to use both for different circumstances.

My own deductive conclusions is this:
Glass (eventhough you would not have guessed it) is poreus.
You notice this when you sprayed glass cleaner onto glass, wipe it dry with some paper and try to stick some papertape (we call it painterstape) on it.
The tape does not stick, because there is still some water in the pores. Therefore I allways use a glass cleaner with some alcohol in it.
The alcohol evaporates quicker and in that process it will let the evaporate the water quicker also.

So grease, fat and dirt will enter the pores and with just a little ammonia you will not be able the get it out of the pores.
You will only get the superficial grease out of the pores. Now if you take a soap molecule, it looks kind like a spermcel: big head and tall tiny body (no it does not really look like me).
The head atracks water and the body atracks fat. If you wipe over the wet, smooth 'saturated' Bon Ami over the glass, the tiny fat seeking body will attach them selves to the grease molecules.
This will only work if there is just enogh water to let the molecules swim so that they can turn themselves around towards the fat molecules.

No the reall magic will come:
When dry we wipe the soap screen away with some force and a paper towel: this in fact means that we are pulling the soap molecules by their fat little head and with that pull the fat and dirt molecules that are chemicaly bonded to the soap also.

So my conclusion:
1. Ammonia and whitning will clean the surface op the pores.
2. Bon Ami will pull out the fat and dirt out of the pores comletely.

Your question: "And, if you have the right Bon-Ami in the powdered form, can't you just shake some on the wet glass or onto a cotton ball? Does it need to be a cake?"
With the soap cake you will certainly know that the soap applied on the glass is completely dissolved, if you would use the powdered form you will smear big powder grains onto the glass and they will not be able to rotate themselves towards the fatmolecules.
So the powdered form can be uses, but you will not be 100% sure that all the soap will function.


p.s. That is why the Bon Ami is made of tallow,
because this makes the hardest soapmolecules and will be able to pull the fat molecules with the most force.
Hope I explained it clearly,
Erik

[Patrick Mackle]

Wow Erik,
I had NO IDEA that soap molecules could be so EROGENOUS. All this time I figured that I was sexually aroused by the intimate act of gilding or silvering glass.
But you have taught me that my feelings are on a much higher level. I must go now, as I have prepared a hot bath of luxurious Bon Ami bubbles. I only used the cake soap so I can feel all those heads and tails whipping my body. Haha. (you are now Erik Einstein)

[Jenny Johnson]

Wow Erik,
I had NO IDEA that soap molecules could be so EROGENOUS. All this time I figured that I was sexually aroused by the intimate act of gilding or silvering glass.
But you have taught me that my feelings are on a much higher level. I must go now, as I have prepared a hot bath of luxurious Bon Ami bubbles. I only used the cake soap so I can feel all those heads and tails whipping my body. Haha. (you are now Erik Einstein)

It also effect the skin and I agree with Erik its right.