Kukui Nut Oil
INCI Aleurites Moluccanus Seed Oil. CAS 8015-80-3, as CosIng gives it. Also: Candlenut oil, Lumbang oil, Aleurites moluccanus seed oil, Aleurites moluccana seed oil, Aleurites triloba oil, Candle-nut oil.
Published values
| Saponification value | 191.3–198.81 mg KOH/g (typical 191.3) |
| Used by the calculator | 191.3 mg KOH/g (typical) |
| SAP for NaOH | 0.1364 g/g |
| Iodine value | 162 g I₂/100 g |
| INS (SAP − IV) | 29 |
| Melting point | — |
| Unsaponifiable matter | 0.38 % |
Soapmaking books print about 0.135 g NaOH per g (median of 8 books), which agrees with ours to within 2 %.
A bar made of 100 % Kukui Nut Oil
Conventional qualities summed from the fatty-acid groups; a single-oil bar is a reference point, not a recipe.
How much lye
| Oil | NaOH | KOH |
|---|---|---|
| 500 g | 64.8 g(64.8–67.3) | 90.9 g(90.9–94.4) |
| 1 kg | 129.6 g(129.6–134.6) | 181.7 g(181.7–188.9) |
| 1 lb (454 g) | 58.8 g(58.8–61.1) | 82.4 g(82.4–85.7) |
| 2 lb (907 g) | 117.5 g(117.5–122.1) | 164.9 g(164.9–171.3) |
For this oil alone at 5 % superfat, with pure sodium hydroxide (NaOH) or pure potassium hydroxide (KOH); in brackets, across the published range of its saponification value. KOH is usually sold at 90 %: divide by 0.9. For a whole recipe, open the calculator.
Fatty-acid profile
Saturated : unsaturated 8 : 92
| Fatty acid | Published range, % | Used | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Palmitic acid | C16:0 · saturated | 2.1 | 2.1 |
| Stearic acid | C18:0 · saturated | 4.7 | 4.7 |
| Oleic acid | C18:1 | 17 | 17.0 |
| Linoleic acid | C18:2 | 61.6 | 61.6 |
| α-Linolenic acid | C18:3 n-3 | 5.2 | 5.2 |
Recipes that use it
- Kukui and nut oil bar 6 % of the oils
- Kukui and almond shampoo bar 3 % of the oils
Guides that discuss it
Where these numbers come from
Full-text PDF (text layer extracted). Table I = physical and chemical characteristics (SAP 191.3, IV 162 Hanus, unsaponifiable 0.38 %); unsaturated- and saturated-acid tables give oleic/linoleic/linolenic and palmitic/stearic as % acid in oil and % glyceride.
Abstract page and full-text PDF (article/view/22228/pdf_79): saponification number 198.8093 (solvent) and 212.9764 (MAE) mg KOH/g, RI, density, FFA; Indonesian candlenuts.
Primary source is the historical characterisation by Riebsomer & Foote (DePauw University), Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Science, pp. 116-119 (year not printed on the fetched pages; references cited go up to 1934), of expressed oil from Hawaiian kukui nuts (Aleurites moluccana, nuts supplied from Wailuku, Maui). Table I: specific gravity (20/4) 0.922; refractive index (Abbe 20 C) 1.4785; iodine number (Hanus) 162; saponification value 191.3; acetyl value 3.2; acid value 17.4; unsaponifiable matter 0.38 %; unsaturated acids 83.8 % and saturated acids 6.8 % (oil basis, corrected). Fatty acids were partitioned by the lead-salt/ether method plus thiocyanogen-iodine number (1930s methods, so the oleic/linoleic/linolenic split is dated): as '% acid in oil' oleic 17.0, linoleic 61.6, linolenic 5.2, palmitic 2.1, stearic 4.7 (sum 90.6 % acid basis; as '% glyceride' 17.8/64.1/5.4/2.2/4.9). These printed '% acid in oil' values are what is stored above as 'typical'; they are slightly lower than a strict % of total fatty acids (which would require dividing by 0.906) and were not recomputed. The same paper quotes West & Montes (Philippine J. Sci. 18:619-635, 1921) for Philippine oil: saponification number 214, iodine number 140, linolenic 6.5 %, linoleic 33.4 %, oleic 56.9 %, solid acids 2.8 % (second-hand, context only). The upper SAP bound, 198.81, comes from the additional modern source Shintawati & Widodo 2022 (CHEMICA: Jurnal Teknik Kimia 9(1):39-46; candlenuts from Pringsewu Regency, Lampung, Indonesia): saponification number 198.8093 mg KOH/g for solvent (ethanol) extraction (used) and 212.9764 mg KOH/g for microwave-assisted extraction (not used, see below), refractive index 1.477-1.478, density 0.841-0.893 (solvent) / 0.851-0.867 (MAE) g/mL, free fatty acid 2.8085 % (MAE); that paper reports no iodine value and no fatty-acid profile. A 2022 rat-study paper (Diabetology & Metabolic Syndrome 14:80, PMC9178887) prints a GC-MS ester profile that is not internally plausible (e.g. 'methyl arachidate' 41-48 %) and was not used. No document opened gives a melting point (liquid drying oil). No range for palmitoleic, arachidic etc. is available from the sources opened. INCI name from CosIng. The typical is Riebsomer and Foote's 191.3, which matches the 191.5 their own fatty-acid figures imply. Shintawati and Widodo's microwave-extraction figure, 212.98, is read and not used: the same paper gives densities of 0.851-0.867 g/mL for that oil (0.841-0.893 for the solvent extract) where kukui oil is about 0.92, so something other than the oil, or a faulty method, was measured. Their solvent-extraction 198.81 stays as the upper end.
This record is part of the open ingredient database (ODbL), which you can download as CSV or JSON. Found an error or a better primary source? Corrections with a link to the document are welcome at support@soapformulator.com.