Beesource Beekeeping Forums banner

candles won't stay lit

28K views 16 replies 8 participants last post by  David W. 
#1 ·
Hello all,
I am new (5 years) to beekeeping and also candle making. I did already find answers right here to some of my questions. I have made some 3" wide pillar candles with beeswax using #60 wicking. The candles just won't stay lit. They just burn down the center a little and then drown in the wax. I have ordered some new wick after reading about the square braid type of wick in different sizes to see if that helps. The wax is nice and clean. I melted it several times in water to get out the gunk. Any ideas as to what may be wrong. Thanks.
Pat in WI
 
#2 ·
Hello Pat,

The wick you are using is too small... you need to use a thicker wick. I use a square braided cotton wick that I buy from kerzenidee in Germany (I am based in Australia). They are really good people to deal with.

This page on their website will tell you a bit more about the correct sizes of wicks for various candle widths: http://www.kerzenidee.de/index.php?auswahl=dochte&sprache=eng

Essentially what is happening in your case is that the flame is burning up the wick too fast - the wick doesn't have enough body to allow it to feed the flame with the surrounding wax. Therefore the wick becomes smaller and smaller eventually drowning the flame in the liquid wax and forming a tunnel effect - with a lot of un-molten wax still present at the edges of the candle.
 
#7 ·
I have read that the first time a pillar is burned that it should burn one hour per inch of diameter to condition the candle. Supposedly after the first burn, then the pillar can be burned for less time at a time. They stated if this wasn't followed that the pillar would tunnel. So a 3" pillar should burn about 3 hours till almost the edge of the candle.

I agree with the others that small wicks tend to drown as they have enough umph to keep melting the wax, but not feed the flame fast enough. Therefore, they drown in the melt pool.

Candle hugging the edges is also recommended by some.
 
#13 ·
You can also filter through paint filters. They have some that are very fine. You may need to reenforce the screen because the wax is so hot it can break it loose from the size of the filter funnel. I save this for the LAST filtering otherwise it clogs up too much and difficult to get all the wax through. The larger mesh ones are better for the midlevel filtering.
 
#14 ·
Thanks all. I have gotten some new wicks and they burn fine now. I was able to but several different sizes from Peak Candle. They have 10 yard packs for a reasonable price, so I finally got it right. I also refiltered the was as I poured to. Thank you all so much.
Pat
 
#16 ·
Hi David
I was originally using the 60 ply wick and that is what also did not work for me. I ended up with the number 6 square braid from Candlewic. It was nice because I could buy a small packet of different sizes of the square braid from them. I started with their number 3 and worked up from there. Good luck with yours.
Pat
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top