Forrest

Oh how I wish. My skin is allergic to fragrances or I would be all over the soap making.

Yea, but I lengthened it by sticking with one container.

Well that makes me feel better, I have several honeysuckles, Volcanos, and White Tea and Gingers. I did finally find a White Tea and Ginger that works for me. It sounds like I need to divide them in to three boxes. A never going to use box, a might blend with something box, and a put in wax box. I could use up the put in wax box. Work on my blends to reduce the blend box, and hide the never going to use box under the bed. I could take the tops off and that room would smell good for a long time. I’ll be glad when I get to the top of the curve because it’s all downhill from there.

After Christmas I decided to take the good advice that was being offered and do some serious wick testing. Perhaps I went a little overboard because I now have a massive wick collection, most of which will never get used. Along the way I still fed my FO addition by giving it a few sample sizes now and then. But as my testing was winding down, my search for new FOs was, as we say at NASA, reaching escape velocity. I’ve slammed on the brakes now until I can get organized, but losing control of my FO addition has left me with an overabundance of sample size FOs. To put it simply I lack the ability to make more than two candles in any one scent. My storage space is beyond maxed out, so something has to give, it is time for me to start buying larger bottles of FOs and I have a considerable list of them to buy. What do you do with all the sample size FOs that you don’t use? If I take up any more space with candle making my wife will divorce me, and I’m rather fond of her.

I'm wicking mine for a average room temp of around 72, which is why the short wick in the test was perfect at 80. I burned a scented one I made two weeks back yesterday and by cutting the wick to 1/8 I got a perfect burn. The great thing is I can pour an 8oz tin for a new FO and even if it needed to be wicked up or down for the FO I can still enjoy the candle by adjusting wick length.

Trap, I’m an engineer, you are an artist. All I am doing is paying attention to what TT says and running test to prove her right. I was thinking that when the weather cools my house down to the low 70’s I’ll be able to double wick the 11oz tureens. I can use wick length to compensate for the uneven burn. I’ll never be able to sell them, but they’ll look pretty in my den.

Well if I had to pick one today I would pick Community Candle because their FOs tend to be stronger and they are such nice people; however my hit rate is better with Nature's Garden, but I'm certain my favorite is one I haven't tried yet so I must try the all.

For now I'm strictly an amateur, and you are absolutely correct, 1/8 inch is difficult in tins and would be almost impossible in some containers. I did a test on cure time, but later realized that not controlling my wick length made the results questionable. I weigh and measure the melt pool width every half hour when I'm testing and I'll do the same for the tins I make using FOs so I can understand how the various FOs effect the burn.

No, but I felt I had learned all I needed from the test so I melted them down and made scented candles. If the forecast is right I'll need to cut my wicks to a little a quarter inch by the time I burn these. On a side note if my scented candles need wicking up or down I can just adjust the wick length and get good use out of the first one and then adjust the wick.

Well you were right, as always. The short wick had a 2.3 melt pool at 4 hours while the middle one reached 2.6. The short wick had a 3.1 g/min burn rate vs 3.6 g/min for the middle wick. The long wick was so hot it was a safety issue. I'm thinking just a hair longer than 1/8 in would be perfect at 80 degrees.

So TallTayl I can adjust my wick length to compensate for environmental conditions, and although I believe everything she tells me I wanted to quantify it. So 12 days ago I poured three 8oz tins with 6006 wax and 51 zinc wicks. This morning I cut the wicks to 1/8, ¼, and ½ inches and ran a four hour test. Some of the results were expected and some weren’t. The half inch wick mushroomed quickly, and reached a FMP in less than two hours. The thing that surprised me was that the quarter inch mushroomed some after two hours; however, given that my house is at 80 degrees I would have expected it to be over wicked. To sum it up there was more than a wick size difference between the 1/8 and ½ inch wicks. Just after lighting the wicks After one hour After four hours

Although I have no experience with them I've noticed people have trouble with deeper containers over heating near the bottom.

If I were not a candle masochist these are the characteristics I would look for in a container 1-Attractive 2-Glass 3-Has a lid 4-Straight sides 5-Not too deep There are several containers that meet 2-5, so to pick my favorite it would be the most attractive of that group. Any container that has those characteristics should be relatively easy to wick and make a save and attractive candle.

On this site you can learn everything you need to know about how to make good candles, how to sell them, and why you shouldn't.

True, but I have a wife and two daughters for that so I get a double dose. Clearly I need therapy, but I don't have time for that, I already go to therapy three times a week for my FO addiction.

Well if your goal in life is to go bald and age 10 years I highly recommend you try. Otherwise I would avoid it at all cost.

Well I am a candle masochist, so I like tureens.

I have three identical candles in 8oz tins that I’m planning on using to for a test on the effect of variations in wick length. They should be cured enough by Saturday so I’ll do my first burn then, but I need to decide what lengths to cut the wicks. I think 1/8 inch is the shortest I could cut a wick with any accuracy. So maybe I should go with 1/8, ¼, 3/8 inches, or should I make the long one ½ inches?

The wood that the stir sticks are cut from is going to have variations. Some are going to be harder than others even though they were cut from the same board. You would also find some variation in any given stick.

Oh my, I must try them in my tureens

Welcome, you will find a lot of knowledgeable people on this board. You seem to be coming at this from the angle of the wick being fixed and the wax varying, which is completely different from what I have seen here before. Perhaps if you rephrase your question it would help. Most people here select their container and wax and then vary the wick size and type to get the proper melt pool.

Well if you have mice you just need to stop feeding your cats until they do their jobs. If I have mice the wicks will be the least of my worries as my wife has a phobia about rodents.

Wait, we're supposed to bring our Holiday decor inside? We have a rule in our house that if the Christmas decorations haven't been put up by the forth of July then they stay up.

Do they have any storage requirements? Just curious, as I have a considerable wick collection, and their not stored in the best environment..

If it smells good in January it will smell good in June. The only scent that has a season for me is the one that smells like my Christmas tree.