MeAndMyPuppyDog

2 of us that use a really big saw. I can zip through a lot of pillars very fast.

It's the only way to go as far as I'm concerned. What's your post chop protocol? How do you keep 'em clean or clean them after? The waxdust (sawdust - hehe) is all over the place...

What'ya do?

Pete

With a really big saw.

So far I'm in good shape just jacking up the dye content. Burn is still ok. I just want to take care to not stain the molds toooooooooooooooooooooooo badly.

Pete

I darkened up the color a bit -- all if perfect now.

Leave the hair dryer for the mrs. and the oven for the cookies that go in my belly.

Oh man. This isn't what I wanted to hear... and it doesn't make sense. But I'm going to try a run heating the molds and see what happens... I'll try the heatgun method...

Pete

Oh boy... that's not what I wanted to hear. The silicone route was supposed to make it easier... NOT add a step.

So you're saying it's the temp of the mold -- pouring the wax hotter won't make any difference?

Well I come to you folks with my head in my hand.

What's the secret. I beg of you.

I have some simple two piece silicone molds. Small floaters. We're talking 2 ounce of wax.

No matter what I do, the color is lighter than say a 2 ounce votive that from the SAME batch of wax. Upon close inspection of candle it appears that tiny air bubbles INSIDE (NOT ON SURFACE) the candle are causing the candle to appear lighter.

I attribute this to the candle cooling to quickly because the mold is too cool and absorbs the heat from the wax too fast. (where metal disperses the heat quickly). I can jack the wax up to any temperature you tell me to. I've tried it at temps well over 240 with the same problem. What to do? Should I turn it up even hotter?

Help?

Thanks,

Pete

It's a peach with a hint too much red. Go with red and yellow and make a very light orange. That's peach. Now go a tiny bit more on the red.

It's all by feel and look.

Not really, but you can use Rub N Buff....

Back when I sold Partylite, they told us that they whipped their candles also to increase the burn time. This was back in 1995 and 1996 though.

Good gosh! If I could *only* get my hands on that information in writing...

WAX = Fuel

More air in wax @ same volume = Less Fuel = Less burn time.

Hehe... Darn, and I thought you found it for real.

Yes. Very true. Another reason for it is to reduce freight (lowers weight, obviously) -- import novelty candles are notorious for doing this. Ya pick up a candle off the shelf that you think should 'x' and it weights x-3 lbs.)

There are different degrees to which you can do this.

From my searching I have not found a Pegasus candle mold on the site mentioned. I found a Unicorn, which is a horned horse. But not a winged horse.

If I'm wrong, point it out.

I don't see what the problem would be unless you're doing cold pours. Otherwise unscented wax shrinks and drops out of aluminum molds easily once the candle is fully cooled. With additives like Vybar and UA you might need a catcher's mitt.

Candles were made before we started saturating the wax with FO, so there's no need for a substitute. Lol, especially since they went to all the trouble to take it out and make fully refined wax.

But if you need mineral oil you can get 5 gallon pails from DPS Wax and STE Oil.

Just a free tip for others. Cost control is key!

For Mineral Oil I was able to find it for under $10 a gallon. In order to figure it out too, here's the hint: Think about EVERY conceivable use for the oil and then go with the group that can afford to pay the least. (Oh, and this is food-grade white!)

Okay, so I looked a little harder at their site.

It looks like a few of the paraffin waxes you can get that price if you order 211 cases. That's 10,550 lbs of wax.

You only have to order 10 cases to get their container fill (CF) for 78cents/lb

Were there any others?

"Container Fill" should be lower melt temp and thus even cheaper than the 140ish that I use. Look around -- you'll find it.

Who/what is Binder? I've never heard of them? What kind of wax do they sell?

edited to add: I think I found it. Are you referring to the owners of Candlewic?

Yes.

And an FYI: They'll tell you that they are slabbing domestic (read IGI) -- I call a good solid B.S. on that one. They are taking imported (most likely China) and adding a few polymers to make it nice-a-nice and then slabbing it. I don't see it being IGI for that price. And I don't care. On a good day, when all else fails, I buy from them, IF they play nice on the truck cost. When they're feeling greedly I go with other places.

Man that would be perfect if a person had a nice line of novelty candles that didnt need scent or tapers and such. I would just be afraid of the quality not being the same from order to order with wax like that. Plus we all have our favorite waxes, so it would be hard to pick a wax based on what you want to pay. Would be like buying fragrance oils for a few dollars a pound, you might get lucky and you might get stuck with a stinker.

Bruce

I guess. I've been buying wax based on price since 1990 and have had some variation. But what most people fail to understand is that those variation occur with the "name brand" stuff too. A good candle maker can touch the wax and know too slick, too hard, just right. And from there add Vybar, Steric, Petrolatum, etc. There really isn't reason to buy anything more than basic wax. Granted we pour mostly containers, pillars, floaters, and some novelty shapes... 90% of it is unscented, but I've never had an issue. And I wouldn't buy wax at some of the prices I'm seeing in this thread. Will I ever see 29 cent wax again? No. But it was in the 40 range for A LONG time... so this was bound to happen.

I can tell you guys this much. Binder is selling it for $.77 and that's the published price on the site. So what does that tell you? Even at $.77 he is making money. So the next best thing for you to do is negotiate from there. Now, if you have to work freight it becomes a different story. Then what you want to do is look at it geographically and do A LOT of research.

Now. If you're willing to go with palletized (no individual boxes) and you don't mine Imported (then you can still get it in the low 60, even 50 range.

We're in the 18-20K Lb. range... I've been able to keep the price in the .65-.70 range delivered. But it takes A LOT of negotiating. Don't waste your time with IGI. They are worthless. I was willing to buy a truckload at one point their price was TEN cents HIGHER than what I could buy a pallet for DELIVERED.

Hi Bruce,

Yeah the tin (Pourette) ones are great for release, but take up more space, and are seamed. The reasont the Pourette ones work so well is that they put a slight taper on them, so you don't have the air/vac lock issues you have with alum - straight sided ones.

The silicone helps, but but not really like it should. I simply know that there's a way to make it so they just slide out like a scented one would. I'm thinking I'm going to go with 20 ounces to 150 lbs and that should do it. Plus as you run the molds the residual oil left inside the mold should make things move along better.

I just want to get my cost down on the oil... so I have some running around to do. I found a 5 gallon jug for $60 but then I have to pay shipping... so I have to really look into things. Probably cheaper to buy it at WalMart or Home Depot or something.

Pete

No prob.

Ok. Here's the not-so controlled result.

On the 3x3 and 3x6 there are no problems, they slide right out. The 3x3 really were never a problem and the 3x6 were usually no problem. There is a noticeable ease with the 3x6. The 3x9, the most problematic ones... are hard to tell right now. They are NOT 100% cool, and anyone who has ever pulled a 3x9 unscented, from an untapered aluminum pillar mold knows. They have to be cool. I was able to get 10 out of 15 out even though they were warm. I would *like* to think that had they NOT had the mineral oil in them they would have not come out at all...

So. I think the next step is to wait for the other 5 to cool completely, do a burn test, and then see about increasing the % if needed.

Anyone know any good sources for mineral oil aside from Home Depot?

Isn't that too much? Should it perhaps be .3 and not 3.12?? Just wondering.

Well... let me work it out again, it is possible I made a mistake.

If you have a pound. Which equals 16 oz. And folks here seem to say that between 1/2 and 3/4 of an oz. per pound of mineral oil where you want to be. So that would be, .5/16 (or 1/16 and then divide that in half.) either way you get: .03125 which is 3.125%.

Now, take 150 lbs and you can either multiply it by 16 and render it to ounces or not. Either way, 3.125% of 150 = 4.6875 lbs.

I have to agree, that is probably WAAAAAAYYYY tooooooooo much, I just ran a run with 10 ounces to 150 lbs. We'll see from there. The fragrance is just barely noticable. I'll have to buy a can of the unscented stuff if this works out.

I'm going to go down and pull some now and see what the scoop is.

Pete

Yeah, there was a time I thought that was a lot too. That's the small vat.

And our bigger vat isn't big enough either. In the perfect world, I'd like to use the 150 for melting down the scrap wax into slabs. This way I could store the slabs and then use them for color runs closest to what is needed for a particular run. Keep the current bigger vat for regular runs and then use a newer bigger vat for those "gotta get done" runs.

But who knows... so many things going on. We've used Vybar and straight para, but wax quality the past year or so has been crap. So I'm giving this mineral oil idea a try.

Geee, you think the customer will notice the slight baby oil scent? Hehe. Yeah, next time I'll go an see if Home Depot has straight mineral oil in gallon containers (anyone know of any other sources?)

Pete

P.S. I found it on the net, and if you think I'm paying $13 for a gallon of mineral oil, you're out of your mind!

I'm going to go with the 1/2 ounce per pound.

So.

.5/16 = .03125 = 3.125% Mineral Oil

We are dealing with 150 lb batches.

So... we're talking about roughly 4.68 pounds of mineral oil. That is waaaaaaaaaay too much from what I can see.

Time to experiment!

So... you make unscented pillar candles, say 3x9 in Candlewic's (or a reseller of theirs) aluminum molds. You're running something like 140-142 -- let's talk about what you add to the wax to keep them sliding out of the mold easily...

Pete