I know that this forum is for candlemaking, but this is the closest to my inquiry. I have enough burr comb to use for furniture polish. What do you use to melt it? Do I need a double boiler, or will an old pan do it? I have a gas stove if that is important. I have never done this before. I want to try this first before trying candlemaking. Can you use burr comb for candles?
WindsorDavid
05-01-2007, 11:56 AM
I melt all my cappings wax, burr comb and old comb in a homemade solar melter. I took an old deep hive body and put a storm window on top. I put the wax in an aluminum roasting pan with some holes punched in the bottom. I used the screen from some package boxes as a filter. The melted wax ran into a bucket partially filled with water. On days when the outside temp was at least 80 and sunny the wax melted quite quickly.
Next I melt the 98% cleaned wax in a double boiler set-up on my camp stove. Then I pour the wax thru on old T-shirt to filter out most of the remaining junk and into a half gallon orange juice container with the top cut off. I get nice blocks of very clean wax. I use it to make candles, but I'm sure you can use it for polish as well.
If it doesn't work the first time, you can also remelt the wax and start over. Just remember, whatever tools you use for processing wax will never be clean again!