First off I would like to thank Danny for the opportunity to try this soap, it has been on my "want to try" list for a while, and through Danny's generous PIF I was finally able to give it a whirl. While I have read where some say it smells of a urinal puck, when this arrived my daughter and I both agreed that we liked the scent, then when my wife came home and sampled the scent the first words out of her mouth were, "Smells like the urinal pucks in the storeroom at work." Being preoccupied with the new VDH kit that arrived I hadn't had a chance to mess with this soap yet, but as I was reading through some of today's SOS posts I saw where there was mention of this soap being latherably challenged, so I thought I would give it a try. Dropping the puck into a small dollar store bowl, I let it soak for a couple of minutes under some hot water while my vintage Rubberset boar brush soaked in my scuttle. I then drained the water off of the soap and shook most of the water out of the brush. Taking the damp brush and beginning to attempt to load it off of the soap, I was amazed at how fast this soap started to foam up, and how fast the volume of foam multiplied. It seemed within just a few short seconds I had begun to overflow the small bowl, so I scraped out all the foam and placed it in the lather bowl of my scuttle, and continued to work the foam. Once in the larger bowl the foam continued to expand and grow, until in a short while the bowl was almost completely full of foam. Now notice I say foam and not lather, the foam never did become a thick rich lather, just a dry airy foam that sometimes had small puffs whiffing through the air and disappearing. I tried to apply this foam to my face, but by the time I had applied it to my neck the stuff on my cheeks had started to dry up and disappear. I now rinsed the brush, scuttle, and my face clean. Soap 1 ~ Bill 0 Try number 2: Thinking maybe I wasn't getting enough soap loaded on the brush, I removed it from the bowl and held the soap in my hand while I loaded the brush. Using a much wetter brush this time, I did 15-20 seconds of load time, and again I had lots of foam in the brush and dripping into the sink. I took the brush to face and built the [slash]lather[/slash] foam on my cheeks, of which there was copious amounts in record time, but it never turned into a lather no matter how hard I tried. After a couple of minutes of trying, I thought I would start over again. So I rinsed the brush, and my face clean. I will say that as I was rinsing the foam off, the layer was very, very slick on my cheeks. Soap 2 ~ Bill 0 Try number 3: This time I was bound to sure to load my brush, so I spent extra time on the loading my brush, so much so that the Master logo on top of the puck is gone. Taking the now very loaded brush to my face and I again started to try to get a lather, the base layer was very thick, and paste like in consistency. I slowly started to add water to the mix by dipping the tips of my brush in water, then working it into the paste like layer. As the water was worked into the paste, it began its magical transformation into foam, but completely bypassed anything I would call a lather. When I would look down into the sink to dip my brush, the foam I had built on my face would begin to disappear before I looked back up. After several minutes of this struggle, I began to get a burning sensation on my neck, and decided it was time to throw in the towel and admit defeat. As I was rinsing off the foam for the last time, I again noticed how slick my cheeks and face felt. Soap 3 ~ Bill 0 It was now time that I had to leave to pick up my daughter, so I skipped the shave and just rinsed my face and cheeks off, then dressed and left. A little while later as my daughter and I were eating lunch, my face felt like it was drying out, and I think the probable cause was the Master soap. So that is my long winded experience with the Master Mug Soap, and again I would like to thank Danny for giving me a chance to try the soap out. :thanks
That's my expierience as well but I didn't give a third try. Loading up the brush I thought it'd be awesome but only turned to fluff like too much dishwashing soap in the sink. On the bright side it smells really good and I now have 4 pucks of lilac vegetal smelling hand soap.:mad:sad029
Sorry guys. The puck I got from my barber was given to me about a year ago-I suspect it was a different formula because I tried it on one of my new pucks when I saw WW SOTD. I also had great difficulty getting a shaving lather. The old puck (almost gone) does a much better job. The new one has the same nice scent, but anemic lather. I added some unscented Truefitt SC and it was very nice. I guess it'll be reserved for superlather when I run out of the old stock.
Don't sweat it Danny, you saved me money by letting me try it for free, and I thank you for it. :happy088
Bill, maybe try to scrape the soap and remove some of the outer layer, then try the puck again. Danny says his old puck is almost gone, which means he is in the middle somewhere. Looking at the soap on different websites, it looks like it is pressed in a hydraulic press, especially with the detailed logo. If it is pressed, sometimes the mold they are made in is coated with something to allow the mold to "release" the product. I worked in a factory which pressed candles in a hydraulic press (50 tons of pressure). Each time the machine is set to press, just before the material is added, it sprays a release agent into the molds so the candle would not stick. It is possible that Master does something similar to their soaps if they are pressed. It is just an thought.
Thanks for the idea, but I've stripped so much off of the top of the puck now that the embossed logo is gone, it just won't turn from foam into lather. :shocked002 Danny must have sent you my puck by mistake!
