bfroberts

I am burning Tennessee's Pom right now. To my nose, it is pure fruit, not too sweet, and not spicy at all. Seems to have a pretty good HT in my 6006 and its been poured just 3 days. It is kinda one dimensional...would be a good mixer.

http://www.craftserver.com/topic/105345-htp-and-cd-wick-equivalency/?hl=%2Bwick+%2Bchart#entry987809 That may be what you are looking for.

The largest zinc wicks I had on hand when I started this project were 60's. I tried single wicking with those, and it was OK-ish, but I ended up with more mushrooming and too much wax at the end of the burn. Also, double wicking seemed to give me a better throw. I felt like 62's might work, but I never got around to ordering any. If I continue with this, I will definitely want to test with those. Ironically, recently I pulled out a candle I made about 2 yrs ago with 464 single wicked with a Premier wick in a 26oz apothecary. It has burned beautifully. This 6006 has been a totally different experience. Maybe if the zincs were available more incrementally like Premiers. I don't know. So many of my 6006 testers seem to need an in between size when there isn't one available. I also think it is possible that I am being too picky. So far, I have managed to wick 6 FO's successfully. One of which I feel like is the best candle I've ever made, so despite my extreme frustrations, this project has actually been a success on many levels. What started as using up extra supplies may end up with me adding these to our product line. I didn't give this wax a fair shake when I worked with it before.

They aren't dipped. You place aroma beads and FO & color in a jar or ziploc bag and shake them periodically. The beads will soak up the FO. After the aroma beads have soaked up all the FO, bake the beads inside metal cookie cutters. You can fill the cookie cutters up to the thickness you want. These were about 3/8" thick. I bake them at 340 for about 8 minutes. I like them to be kinda bumpy, but I think if you bake them longer the surface will be more smooth.

These are two types I did yesterday. The snowflake is Black Ice and the apple is Mac Apple. I'm soaking beads now in different colors so I can get more creative with my new cookie cutters. So far, I've only done single colors.

Wow! That is awesome. I am having a lot of fun with these, and everyone has raved about them. I've ordered a bunch of cookie cutters, which just arrived yesterday, and I am just itching to get to work making these. As usual, you guys are a wealth of knowledge. Thanks for the info!

Well, I poured one as OldGlory mentioned and I'll see what happens. We burn a candle every day in our store/office, so most of my rejects get used up with a purpose anyway. Plus, I am desperate. I'm really struggling today with the testers I have burning. I have Cinnamon Broom (Tenn.) double wicked with 36z's going now and it has the wimpiest flames. Twice now I've walked by it, and the air movement has blown out one of the wicks. This same combo was overwicked with 2 44-24-18's. It burned well until the bottom 1/3, at which point it liquefied all the wax and was a little too hot. Single wicked with 60z left a huge mushroom, a little soot, and way too much wax at the end. This is what I'm finding with at least half the FO's I've tried. I'm really discouraged with this project today. I have only worked with jelly jars, salsa jars and square masons before, and never have I had such a problem with wicking.

I've recently started making ornies, and they have been very well received. My question is, how far in advance can I make them without them losing their fragrance? Basically, what kind of shelf life do they have? They will be stored in individual cello bags with a twist tie closure. Thanks!

Interesting strategy. I will try one double wicked that way and report back. Thank you for your insight, OldGlory.

Would that work? I just assumed it would be too hot on one side. I'm willing to try anything (obviously..lol).

It looks like double wicking is what it's gonna be. I'm not necessarily opposed to doubles, but I did initially want to single wick....for no reason other than I thought it would be less work using less wicks. What I'm finding is that sometimes double wicking with 36's isn't quite enough but 44-24-18's is too much. I need an in-between.

Candybee, have you had any luck single wicking apothecaries? I could narrow my testing if I would give up on single wicking, but I keep trying even though I haven't been too happy with my efforts. I initially gave up on single wicking because I had too much wax left over at the end of the jar. But then I realized my largest zinc wicks had the 9mm tabs, so I wondered how much more wax would be consumed if I retabbed with the 6mm's. That led to more testing and more frustration, and here I am. The struggle is real.

I've played around with palm a bit, but I never thought about adding chunks. It is very pretty, and I bet it smells amazing!

I was very concerned about ordering it, but I was so deep into this testing, I just crossed my fingers and bit the bullet. I ordered it from CS who I've never used for wax before, and it doesn't show a lot # on the box, but so far it appears to be OK. That is the one thing that has gone right since I took this project on.

Don't dig into your candle supplies and find a lot of stuff you aren't going to use for normal production and decide to use it up by making gifts for your family for Christmas. Here's why. I had a few slabs of 6006 left over from a failed attempt a year or more ago. And I had some 10 oz apothecary jars I wasn't using, and a bunch of different wicks, and more Christmas-y scents than I will need this year. So, I thought it would be a grand idea to make candles for the fam. Not. Even though I read every post I could find on wicking apothecaries with 6006 and even started a thread to ask for advice, I still can't quite get it right. I started with what I thought were my problem FO's and I figured those out fairly easily. I thought it would be pretty easy to move on to less problematic FO's. It's not. They are all problems with this wax in this jar. I should have just made one scent and stopped there. But I didn't want them all to have the same scent. At this point, I'm pouring 3 testers for every FO, and have 3 different wick combo's. Now I'm running out of wax, and I had to order another case, even though I didn't NEED a whole case, but I can't pay slab prices and shipping. It's so much cheaper to buy a case.....of wax that I might never use. I'm an idiot. I was trying to use up this wax. Now I've purchased MORE. AND to top it all off, I realized way into this project that my 3 different wicks have 3 different size tabs. The largest has a 9mm neck, the middle has a 6mm neck, and the smallest has a 3mm neck. I've spent the afternoon retabbing the 3's and 9's and trying to find a supplier that has 36-24-24z's with a 20 x 6mm tab. There's no such animal apparently. Sooo, what this means is I will have to order some of the 36's with the 3mm's and retab them all, and I am running low on tabs, so I will have to buy some of those too. And just to add insult to injury, I'm hot gluing the wicks in my tester jars, and I just pulled out my last stick of high temp glue. Geez Louise. I coulda gone to Yankme for a whole lot less.

Just a few thoughts from a relative newbie.... My heat gun came from Harbor Freight for less than $15. Life saver. This forum is, bar none, the best resource online. Bad info is rampant on Pinterest, blogs, FB, etc. I can't speak for all, but my suppliers advice and recommendations have been spot on almost every single time. Don't hesitate to ask. I found it more economical for my purposes to purchase several of the $1 bags of 12 wicks from Aztec to get started. I bought the size and type they recommended (Premier) for my container, plus 3 sizes up and 3 sizes down. They also allow you to purchase 5 1oz sample FO's for $5 once a month with coupon code. They will use USPS so shipping of small items is very reasonable. Also, Tennessee Candle Sup. will allow 1st timers to purchase 20 1oz FO's for $20 with code. Their shipping is reasonable also. About those burners, if you decide to go the double boiler route, I would go with a Waring single burner unit. I've never had any luck with the cheaper types (we've gone thru a lot of these burners in our main business). They are around $50 on Amazon, so a Presto pot from WM would actually be cheaper. However, I still find that double boiler....I use a lg. pour pot in a small stock pot on my kitchen stove..... is actually easier for doing small pours, testing, etc. Good luck!

I looked for a lid, briefly and unsuccessfully, but now I'm thinking the plastic dust covers would be my best alternative. My products get handled a lot and I was thinking of securing the dust cover with just a couple dots of hot glue. I don't know if I can make that work. Still thinking on it. Gorgeous jars. I'd love to find a way to use them.

In case anyone is interested, here are my findings after some pretty extensive testing (for me, anyway). I am using 6006. For 10 oz apothecary jars, I settled on double wicking with 2 44-24-18z's. Some FO's burned kinda OK-ish single wicked with 60z, but I got a much cleaner burn, more stable flame, and no mushrooming with the double wick combo. I have marathon burned several of these over the last few days, 8-12 hours at the time. I used medium to heavy FO's.....Blue Sugar (TFC), Plum & Caramel (Aztec), Santa's Pipe (WSP), Blueberry Cobbler (CS), and Under The Tree and Buttercream (both from Tennessee). I also used liquid dye in varying amounts. I am also testing 8 & 16 oz tins using the same FO's. This testing has been a little surprising to me. I expected a 51z to work perfectly in the 8 oz tins, but it just hasn't quite enough with the FO's I've tried so far. I am melting the failures down and repouring using a 60z. As an aside, I pulled some wood wick samples I had and the "Medium" size was perfect in the 8 oz tin and the "Large" worked equally as well in the 16 oz tin. This was tested using Under The Tree FO and Sugar Cookie (TFC). I've only tested 2 each of these so far, but I was surprised at how well they burned. My wood wicks came from Aztec and The Flaming Candle. I don't know how they compare to other suppliers.

11/11/15 Results: The 60z isn't going to work. I am power burning, because I know that is what the recipients are going to do, and I'm 6 hours in. It started off beautifully, good MP, great HT, cool jar. But as it burns down into the jar, the MP has shrunk by more than 1/3, HT is diminished, and it looks like it is going to tunnel from here on out. I've got one more tester poured, so I'm gonna pop in a Premier 790...maybe 795...and see how she does. In other test with same wax/jar combos, two 44-24-18's placed with tabs about 3-4mm apart has burned well with both Buttercream (Tennessee) and Blueberry Cobbler (CS), both of which I usually have to wick up. HT is great, MP good, the jar is just warm. I just really wanted to single wick this jar.

This post made me want to fiddle around with 6006 again. I've been pouring some testers in apothecary jars and tins. So far, I'm liking this wax a lot better than I did when I used the square masons. With the masons, I always had to do repours and that coupled with the mushrooming just did me in. I'm loving it with the tins....no repour required, the throw is good. There's still the massive mushrooming, at least it seems massive to me. I might just have to learn to embrace it.

I think the general consensus is....no throw and cost prohibitive. Eons ago, before I knew anything about anything, I thought I'd make a candle using craft store wax and rosewood EO. It was a torch. Literally. It's a wonder I lived to tell that tale. I learned something that day. Candle Science says, "We've done quite a bit of testing with essential oils in candles and have found that they are just not compatible. Through our testing, we have found that they have a good cold throw before you light them, but once they start to burn, you may get very little scent. At the worst, you may get a fuel-like smell. We do still encourage you to experiment and see what you can come up with. If you want to try using essential oils we would recommend you use 1oz of oil per pound of wax." They must not have tested with rosewood EO, or their official statement would have been more emphatically discouraging. Good luck!

Thank you, OldGlory. I started to go ahead use the 60z, but I've read that so many had trouble single wicking this jar....I guess I just needed some validation that it might be possible. I'm working with fairly limited supplies, and I was reluctant to just jump in willy nilly. So, I poured 2 testers, one with the 60z and one double wicked with the 36's. And because I am a gluten for punishment, I used CS's Blueberry Cobbler, which I've always found to be a bear to wick anyway. I will post results in a few days. . Trying to use up some of these jars and wax that I've been kicking around for so long. And I just found some wood wick samples, so there's that possibility to keep me up at night....

Hello, everyone. A recent post has me in mind to try working with 6006 again. I have several slabs left over from an earlier attempt that ended badly. I loved the wax, but since most of our sales are the 8 oz square masons and 6006 didn't pour well into that jar, I gave it up. I would like to use up the 6006 I have by making candles for Christmas gifts for the family, and I am trying to work with the supplies I have on hand without ordering anything I will not use in our normal production. I will be pouring the 6006 into 10 oz. apothecary jars (which should eliminate the air pockets I had trouble with in the mason jars). I have the following wicks on hand: Premier....all sizes from 755 up to 798 HTP....62, 73, 83, 93, 104 Zinc.....36-24-24, 44-24-18, 44-32-18, 51-32-12, 60-44-18 RRD.....47, 50, 55 I would prefer to single wick, but I realize double wicking may be the only way to go, and I am OK with that. I only have a couple of jars to use for testing, because I will need the bulk of what I have for the actual product I am gifting. So, can someone give me a starting point for either single or double wicking using the supplies I already have? I will be using heavier FO's at 6% and 5-6 drops liquid dye per pound of wax. I haven't used this wax in a while, and I don't have a lot of experience with zinc wicks, but I've read a lot of people have had great success with that combo.

Apple In A Pear Tree Holiday Fruit Festival I'm really bad at this. Sorry. Good luck!

I just bought some from NG. They have directions are on the product page, or just search for Aroma Beads on the NG site, and a link to the full PDF will come up. I assume the directions would be the same even tho the supplier is different ??? Maybe. I'm excited to get mine. I've never used them before.