[calvin coolidge]

Hello all,

We finished a lab where we made soap using coconut oil and 6M NaOH and "salted it out" with a NaCl solution. Part of the lab was to take a very small portion of soap, mix it in a test tube w/DI water, and add drops of FeCl3, CaCl2, and MgCl2, in different test tubes, to some of the soap solution and record our observations. All of these produced precipitates. Part of the lab write up is to write a balanced equation for these reactions...I've one problem with this....what is the "formula" for my soap? Do I just use NaOH + FeCl3 etc...? The lab manually has a generalized soap formula as follows:R-C=O-O Na (both Oxygen are bonded to the Carbon)...do I use this instead of previously stated NaOH? I don't know if "generalized" soap formula provided is indicative of the coconut oil we used...

Any guidance would be GREATLY appreciated....

Thx,

~CC