Talk:Stainless steel soap

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Topic

A lot older than that. I first saw this in highschool. I graduated a little less than a decade ago. I think that it is very likely that this has been around a lot longer than that. --Opcn ^{with regards to regarding my regardliness} 17:52, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

What about rust (and bubbles)? And what happens if you have one of these and clean something with vinegar (which, with salt, can be rather effective) while wearing a copper bracelet? 31.51.113.254 (talk) 12:22, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Not to be used for cleaning magnets. 31.49.51.46 (talk) 13:46, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Disadvantages

Is the last one really a disadvantage? I mean, you can get them to jump and have a good laugh at the same time. ^{— Unsigned, by: 24.207.133.59 / talk}

It's a disadvantage when someone does it to you. БaбyЛuigiOнФire🚓^(T|C) 03:53, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

I must've misplaced it. --It's-a me, 🎄LeftyGreenMario!🎄 04:12, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

People actually buy this shit?

I must've had more faith in humanity than I ought to. Carthage (talk) 01:55, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

It makes my skin feel raw just thinking about people using a piece of metal as a “body soap”, and all the friction it would cause. And all the oil and dead skin cells it wouldn’t help scrub out of hair or off the skin respectively. Those who completely put their trus in this must smell like the average Reddit moderator. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}🎄CircularRasoning🎄^{See what I'm planning} 02:52, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

The exfoliation is probably exactly why this probably "works", if it does. I will grant, it seems no one really has formally done a deep dive on this, so "who knows". But it seems like most of the other methods that "work" in folklore involve a combination of exfoliation and/or an acid, such as lemon juice and salt, or toothpaste with baking soda, or coffee grinds, or vinegar. Sure sounds easier than potentially messing with the oxidation layer of your stainless steel item (the very thing that makes stainless steel stuff useful), assuming this even *does* work that way.

Personal anecdote, though: I've chopped many an onion and minced many a garlic clove, and never noticed any lingering odor on the hands that simply washing the hands with soap couldn't clean away. BobJohnson (talk) 03:50, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

Certain precious metals like gold have anti-pathogen properties, so I guess it's not the wildest thing, but I have never heard of steel having those properties. I don't think using a gold bar as a soap bar would do much either. Chillpilled (talk) 03:59, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

It would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and a soap-sized gold piece would be too heavy to even lift. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}🎄CircularRasoning🎄^{See what I'm planning} 04:42, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

The theory (as mentioned in the article) is that the sulfur compounds of garlic / onion combine with the chromium dioxide (edit: chromium oxide, not dioxide) outer layer of stainless steel and gets... whisked away or something. Again, it's not something that has been rigorously tested, so who knows the exact mechanism of this is (if it indeed occurs at all and is not something else). Generally speaking, the informal tests of this (including those linked in the article) seem pretty mixed on efficiency. BobJohnson (talk) 04:17, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

I thought stainless steel doesn’t oxidize, that’s why they add all those other metals with the iron it mostly consists of. And maybe a piece of bronze could work (as copper is very toxic to microbes) but then it’d just oxidize and turn green after a while, or not depending on what percentage of copper it’s made of. --Goatspeed. _{Stalk me}🎄CircularRasoning🎄^{See what I'm planning} 04:37, 23 December 2023 (UTC)

Stainless steel doesn't oxidize via rusting (iron oxide), which is obviously what people want to avoid. Basically, the chromium that is added to stainless steel oxidizes instead, forming a thin layer (via a chemical process called passivation) on top of the iron. This chromium oxide layer is actually anti-corrosive, as opposed to the brittle flaking nature of iron oxide. The "corrosion resistance" section of Stainless steel Wiki article goes into this. There's probably some metal chemists that know way more on the exact how-this-happens then I do (which is Wikipedia-level at best). But I will say that this chromium oxide layer of stainless steel is supposed to be fairly inert. Instinctively, it makes it seem less likely to me that garlic sulfur compounds could interact with it (but, I am not a chemist...). BobJohnson (talk) 05:00, 23 December 2023 (UTC)