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Eropean creams in a tube

I have had the fun of
Proraso Green and Blue
Lavanda
Lea classic cream

All in a tube, and the tubes all shared the same interesting action. Once the seals were broken and the caps came off, they actually emptied themselves out. yes, for some reason in all these tubes the contents would actually come out without having to squeeze the tubes.

yes, all the tubes felt like over inflated balloons,a nd the speed at which they emptied themselves increased after I had squeezed the tubes for a shave.

The folks who make lavanda have NEVER had anyone mention this to them before. Im just curious as to what was going on with these tubes.
 

Flintstone65

Imagining solutions for imaginary problems
That’s been my experience as well....it is a bit annoying, but I really like those creams!!! Curious to hear the science behind the phenomenon.
 
I have Proraso Blue, and GFT Spanish Leather; never seen this happen.
Sounds like they became pressurized somehow.
 
I've had this with my Proraso tube and I thought that it has to do with the tube being metal. When you squeeze a metal tube a tiny bit, it doesn't return to its original shape, the deformed metal pressures some of the cream out. The problem was gone once I stopped applying any pressure to it with my fingers. Not sure about Lavanda, but I think Lea comes in a metal tube too?
 
They're probably filled by something like this:

Crimping the tube on the open end puts a slight amount of pressure on the contents, so they spill out.

Interestingly enough, the airtight plastic bladder used for Proraso Single Blade doesn't do the same.
 
I too have noticed this on occasion with shaving creams.

More often I have seen the opposite, that (e.g. Lavanda) shaving cream has thickened and it takes some effort to force it out of the tube. The latter can be remedied by placing the tube in the refrigerator for a few hours.

I have surmised that this is something that may occur during storage, either due to length of time or temperature effects.
Neither solidification nor liquefaction seem to have a detrimental effect on the performance though.


B.
 
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Cannot say that I have seen this problem but then I have only used two tubed shaving creams, Palmolive and Cowshed Bullocks

Cowshed-Bullocks-Smooth-Shaving-Cream-100ml-0051400.jpg
 

ajkel64

Check Out Chick
Staff member
The only time that I can remember this happening is when I have a bought a tube of cream from overseas and it has turned up in the mail. Whether something happens to the ingredients while pressurized in the cargo hold of the plane is just a guess. That is what I put it down to.
 
I too have noticed this on occasion with shaving creams.

More often I have seen the opposite, that (e.g. Lavanda) shaving cream has thickened and it takes some effort to force it out of the tube. The latter can be remedied by placing the tube in the refrigerator for a few hours.

I have surmised that this is something that may occur during storage, either due to length of time or temperature effects.
Neither solidification nor liquefaction seem to have a detrimental effect on the performance though.


B.
Lavanda is a superbe shaving cream. Its spectacular really. But since they use OATS in the formula I cant use it. Learned the hard way on this one..
 
The subject of "pressuried" shave cream tubes is an interesting one. During my 30 years of being involved in the manufacture of lather shave cream for Gillette around the world I am familiar with two significant causes for this -- one common or other (hopefully) not so.
First - the uncommon one. LSC, having a high pH, will attack aluminium tubes. For this reason the formulations used where the product was being filled into internally unlacquered tubes incorporated sodium silicate which supresses this reaction. It is extremely effective. Where the tubes used were internally lacquered it was usually the case that silicate was not in the formulation. However product that was many years old and filled into unlacquered tubes - even though it contained silicate - would eventually attack the aluminium. One result of this attack is the generation of hydrogen gas which causes the tube to pressurise. How long is "many years"? I can't remember exactly but we're taking about in excess of 10 years. (Incidentally, eventually silicate was added to all Gillette LSC regardless of the aluminium tube spec as the material is very cheap and was considered a safeguard against imperfectly internally lacquered tubes.)
The more common reason relates to the air that is trapped in the cream during manufacutre. Because of the method of manufacture and the viscosity of LSC it is very difficult to make it without trapping small air bubbles in the product. In the complete absence of entrapped air one would expect the LSC have an apparent SG of around 1.06. But in some markets the product specification allowed an SG of as low as 0.85. This was indicative of a significant amount of air in the cream. It was common to cool batches to well below ambient temperature for a number of days to speed up the ageing process of the cream allowing it to be more easily filled as feshly made product was extremely stringy. So when the tube was filled and crimped the cream inside could typically be less than 10 deg C. After filling the temperature of the cream obviously increased to ambient and this caused the entrapped air to expand leading to slight overpressure in the tube. Where the tube/cap seal integrity was not as good as it might be this could even result in cream extruding from the tube. Interestingly, on odd occasions where the tube/cap seal was almost - but not quite - perfect the gap between the tube and cap threads was too close to allow the cream to extrude through but could cause a physical splitting of the cream emulsion which resulted in a clear liquid (aqueous glycerol) to leak out.
 
I hesitate to comment as I havent experienced this problem myself but I am assuming that if this could happen with shaving cream then it could also be an issue with other creams in tubes such as toothpaste?


If you hold the tube uppermost and smooth out the tube so that it is at its maximum volume, then release the cap and try to squeeze out any trapped air, does this cure the problem?
 
I hesitate to comment as I havent experienced this problem myself but I am assuming that if this could happen with shaving cream then it could also be an issue with other creams in tubes such as toothpaste?


If you hold the tube uppermost and smooth out the tube so that it is at its maximum volume, then release the cap and try to squeeze out any trapped air, does this cure the problem?
You can't squeeze out the "trapped air". The "trapped air" is dispersed throughout the cream. The problem wouldn't be found in most toothpastes as they tend to be made under vacuum so air is not absorbed into the cream.
 
You can't squeeze out the "trapped air". The "trapped air" is dispersed throughout the cream. The problem wouldn't be found in most toothpastes as they tend to be made under vacuum so air is not absorbed into the cream.
The strangest thing was, ALL of the companies claimed they had never had a customer complain about it. And the tubes were new stock. Like, 1-2 years old.
 
The subject of "pressuried" shave cream tubes is an interesting one. During my 30 years of being involved in the manufacture of lather shave cream for Gillette around the world I am familiar with two significant causes for this -- one common or other (hopefully) not so.
First - the uncommon one. LSC, having a high pH, will attack aluminium tubes. For this reason the formulations used where the product was being filled into internally unlacquered tubes incorporated sodium silicate which supresses this reaction. It is extremely effective. Where the tubes used were internally lacquered it was usually the case that silicate was not in the formulation. However product that was many years old and filled into unlacquered tubes - even though it contained silicate - would eventually attack the aluminium. One result of this attack is the generation of hydrogen gas which causes the tube to pressurise. How long is "many years"? I can't remember exactly but we're taking about in excess of 10 years. (Incidentally, eventually silicate was added to all Gillette LSC regardless of the aluminium tube spec as the material is very cheap and was considered a safeguard against imperfectly internally lacquered tubes.)
The more common reason relates to the air that is trapped in the cream during manufacutre. Because of the method of manufacture and the viscosity of LSC it is very difficult to make it without trapping small air bubbles in the product. In the complete absence of entrapped air one would expect the LSC have an apparent SG of around 1.06. But in some markets the product specification allowed an SG of as low as 0.85. This was indicative of a significant amount of air in the cream. It was common to cool batches to well below ambient temperature for a number of days to speed up the ageing process of the cream allowing it to be more easily filled as feshly made product was extremely stringy. So when the tube was filled and crimped the cream inside could typically be less than 10 deg C. After filling the temperature of the cream obviously increased to ambient and this caused the entrapped air to expand leading to slight overpressure in the tube. Where the tube/cap seal integrity was not as good as it might be this could even result in cream extruding from the tube. Interestingly, on odd occasions where the tube/cap seal was almost - but not quite - perfect the gap between the tube and cap threads was too close to allow the cream to extrude through but could cause a physical splitting of the cream emulsion which resulted in a clear liquid (aqueous glycerol) to leak out.
I genuinely like this forum. And here's example as to why.
 
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