BLM

Brian's Lube Mix aka BLM

Brian's Lube Mix is a polymer mix that can be combined with water and detergent to create bubble juice. BLM is not a bubble juice itself. It is named after Brian Lawrence who posted this very useful J-Lube/Surgilube mix to SBF, the Soap Bubble Fanciers Yahoo Group (RIP) where it became a staple of many bubblers.

The recipe is provided with his permission. Click here to read his posting about the lube mix on SBF, the Soap Bubble Fanciers Yahoo Group (RIP). An April 2011 posting on SBF further discusses BLM.

See also Gordy's blog entry about mixing BLM.

Equipment & Ingredients

• A kitchen scale (optional)
• A large microwave-safe pitcher or large microwave safe measuring cup
• A microwave oven
• 8 grams J-Lube powder
• 1 ounce (by weight) Surgilube (this is 28.3 grams)
• 8 ounces water (Brian uses distilled water but tap water will work well in most locales)

The vessel that you use for microwaving needs to be at least 4 times larger than the amount of liquid. So, if you are using 8 ounces of water, it needs to be able to hold at least 1 quart (or 1 liter). You should also watch carefully and not let it boil over -- as boilovers are VERY messy to clean up.

Instructions

1. Pour the water into the microwave-save pitcher/measuring cup
2. Add the J-Lube powder
3. [Optional] weigh the vessel plus its contents and write down the weight
4. Place the vessel in the microwave and heat it to boiling.
5. Boil for 6 more minutes watching carefully to avoid boilovers.
6. The mix will boil up to 4 times the amount of liquid, so if you're making a pint, you need a half-gallon-sized pitcher. If it looks like it's going to boil over, halt the microwave for a few seconds and then restart it. You do not want to let it boil over--trust me on this one.
7. Once boiled, you should now have very hot, perfectly mixed J-lube.
8. Let cool to at least 150 degrees F.
9. [Optional] weigh the vessel containing the J-Lube/water solution and add in enough water to replace the water lost during boiling.
10. Mix in the Surgilube while warm/hot but less than 150 degrees F.
11. Brian stores the J-Lube in plastic squeeze bottles, labeled with the date and formula.

NOTES: To make larger or smaller batches, scale the ingredient amounts

Usage

BLM is used by adding it to a water and detergent mix to turn into bubble juice. Here are some ideas:

Basic juice. Mix water and detergent in the desired proportions. Add some BLM (see next paragraph for the amount). Add 1/2 heaping teaspoon of baking powder per liter or quart of water and gently stir. We recommend that you try this with dilutions of 16:1, 20:1 and 25:1 to find the dilution that feels right to you. Keep in mind that in hot or dry conditions that a more dilute solution will often provide longer-lasting bubbles. See Dilution for more about dilution ratios and their importance. You could also substitute another appropriate water conditioner for the baking powder whose role is to regulate the pH.

How much BLM should you use? 1 to 5 ounces (by weight although for most purposes you can use 2 tablespoons as a close approximation since this mix is mostly water) is usually used per gallon of bubble juice. When experimenting with this mix start with 1 ounce per gallon and add more as needed. When too much is added, the bubbles are so self-healing that the slightest air disturbance will break a large bubble into smaller bubbles. Also, the more of this mix that is used the less spherical that the bubbles will tend to be.

Notes

If you don't have an accurate scale, 1/4 teaspoon (1.25 ml) of J-Lube powder is about 0.6 grams. 1 tablespoon of SurgiLube is slightly less than 1/2 solid ounce. The formula is pretty forgiving. So you can use 2 tablespoons (not heaping tablespoons) or 30 ml of Surgilube if you can't weigh it.

Breakdown by percentages (weight):

• Water 86.18%
• Surgilube 10.77%
• PEO 0.76% (25% of the J-Lube is PEO)
• Sugar 2.28% (non-functional ingredient that is used as a dispersant in J-Lube)

1 av. ounce (28.3 grams) of BLM is made up of: 24.4 grams water, 3 grams Surgilube, 0.22 grams PEO (.88 grams J-Lube), 0.66 grams sugar.

HPMC equivalence (in process). Some preliminary data (experiments in Dec. 2010) indicate that you can substitute 3 grams of Dow K15M HPMC plus 25 grams water for 1 ounce of Surgilube. If using a 1% or 2% HPMC solution, for example, you will want to use enough of the solution to provided the needed HPMC level and reduce the amount of water accordingly.

COLD MIX METHOD. Brian prefers the hot mix method, but he has also published a cold mix method on SBF. Read about it here .

Variations

KY-Jelly and its equivalents (HEC-containing lubes) can be substituted for Surgilube. Some people actually prefer the KY-Jelly version. HEC seems a bit more forgiving and the lubes that contain it are easier to find than Surgilube. But, don't call the KY version BLM. BLM refers only to Brian's official recipe made from JLube, water and SurgiLube.