Alan

Georgia, go with "we" and don't flinch. It's you and all your friends at CT rooting for you.

I think you all did an excellent job. Everyone deserves a round of applause! I like how this went. I really wanted to participate, but this weekend was plagued with a bunch of little emergencies. We have to do this again... goal-oriented creation adds a little spice, jogs the mind, and certainly provides motivation... a lot of fun.

It may have been in the right place. I mentioned it to someone in the office a few minutes ago and the spec on the site may have been updated in those few short minutes.

That's a typo. The MP140 won't hold that much without any additives. 3-6% is more typical. The amount of FO retained will vary with each FO, and 4% is certainly a good starting point. I do apologize for the erroneous data. I'm supposed to go through the specs on the site, double check them, and include my own notes. But my notes are on a tape recorder and with everything else going on, I've been dragging my feet at the prospect of going through them. This weekend though I'll go through the pages and check the specs/notes.

That's a good idea Robin. When the power was out at home yesterday evening, I was overwhelmed with all the different scents... way too much. And it was too cold to open the windows. I was wishing we had more unscented candles around... next time

Can I play? Sounds like fun. We have to set a closing date or deadline though. How about we shoot for Friday, 10/14, to post a photo that looks as much like the bbb candle as possible? Whoever wins gets a spot in techniques and ideas. How about it Sara?

You shouldn't have to. HTH :smiley2:

It's the same product. The granularity is just larger on the current lot, but it dissolves just the same. HTH

Before you ask where the bubbles would come from, I should add that the vapor pressure of some components in heated fragrance oil can be high enough that, with the vacuum, they enter a gaseous state... hence the bubbles.

It's vacuum that you want to avoid (as the wax cools and shrinks, as well as the small volume of heated gas above the candle). But, if your lids are notched in such a way to prevent this, then I wouldn't worry about it. A vacuum pressure during cooling can enhance the formation of wet spots and bubbles against the container walls. Cheers, Alan

Congrats on a great start I hope it grows like a weed for you!:highfive:

HenryK, Are we talking scented or unscented candles? FO will also increase opacity. Many people over-look that fact. BTW, you are correct that cooler slowing rates enhance translucency. The larger pillers would have cooled at a slower rate. Cheers, Alan

Reasonable suspicions I suppose. Not bad at all. Truthfully though, it'll be less profitable because having our own exacting blends contract manufactured is more expensive than distributing for IGI, yet we are still going to have to compete price-wise with the products we were carrying. The real reason revolves around business ethics. I don't want to go into any more detail about it than that. But basically we will never tolerate deceptive business practices from any vendor. I don't care how much it hurts us. It comes right down to a matter of principle that requires not a moment of thought. And yes Alex, I might be a bit of a wax geek (among other things). Some of the waxes we'll be introducing next week have been in testing for about two years... so, there's always been a contingency plan in place. I just had to really ramp up testing efforts in the recent weeks to finalize specs. Cheers, Alan :smiley2:

Oh, one more thing, look for good closeout sale prices on anything left early next week .

I should also add to what Nachelle had to say and point out that all IGI/Astorlite waxes are being discontinued by Peak. A few people were aware of that and that is why the inventory moved so fast. So what you see on the Peak site now from IGI/Astorlite is going to be the last of it. Cheers, Alan

Wow, best sales day ever?! Good for you Robin. Your presentations looks awesome. :smiley2:

Do you have any deep stainless mixing bowls? They'll work in a pinch. Cheers, Alan:smiley2:

Sure, combine M29 with 1274/1343a, and you'll find that the mix is more resistant to mottling than any single one of those waxes alone. And yes you are right, "mottling wax" is indeed a term that describes a wax that is likely to mottle. That's sort of true, but it should be a fairly narrow cut to promote the formation of an organized crystal lattice. You need a lot of "like" molecules to get the formation of an organized crystal lattice that leads to the separation of phases (solid and liquid) that we see in a mottled candle. That separation of phases is needed to cause the refraction of light that we witness as mottling. If you have a mish-mash of a bunch of different molecules, you won't get the organized crystal lattice formation that promotes phase separation within the wax. Vybar for instance works on the principle of disrupting this lattice, creating a more random crystalline pattern. One that we can't see with the naked eye, and one that leads to cavities between molecules for the oil to hang out in. Higher MP waxes tend to solidify at a faster rate than their lower MP counterparts when in the same ambient cooling atmosphere. This higher rate of solidification also results in a less organized crystal lattice. That's basic physical chemistry. For large crystals, you have to go slow to allow the molecules enough time to arrange themselves into an organized fashion. Less organization = less mottling. You can reproduce this effect by simply taking something like 1274 and cooling it in a water bath. The accelerated cooling will prevent the formation of an organized crystal lattice. Anyone that has done hurricanes/luminaries with and without a water bath will have noticed that when slowly cooling (when not using a water bath) you'll see much larger crystals on the interior of the shell, sometimes even very pronounced needle-like projections. With faster cooling, these macro crystals have less time to form, and you end up with a smoother interior surface. So basically, anything that would promote the formation of large crystals will promote mottling. This includes a fairly homogeneous molecular make up, and time to allow the molecules to get organized as they go from liquid to solid phase. The liquid phase of the oil (FO or mineral) is needed to provided "break points" in the lattice organization and to provide some light refraction at the wax/oil interfaces. Cheers, Alan

IGI's syneresis papers do not address blending of various melt point waxes. They used straight cuts of each melt point independently If you contaminate a mottling wax, with additives or even with other waxes (higher or lower MP), it will inhibit mottling.

This made me laugh, never thought about it... but I always find myself checking out anything that Nachelle says she went and fixed. Cheers, Alan

There is certainly some truth there as far as pursuing consistency. But really there are so many other variables that will affect a mottle to a larger extent... ambient temperatures, cooling rates, amount of FO, type of FO, size of the candle, etc. If we had it all our way, they'd come out exactly as imagined everytime:D

They carry two different product numbers, so it is easy to assume they are somehow different. Consider this though... four years ago there was no "A" version and no "N" version of the 1343. It was simply 1343. Back then, we were about the only company to offer that wax. When I noticed that one lot didn't mottle as expected and brought it up with IGI, the A and N versions were appended to the product. Look closely at those spec sheets. All the tolerances of 1343 overlap with 1274. The only minor differences exist in the "typical" values. And the variance is trivial. The published tolerances are identical. Does the spec sheet for 1343 reference the A or the N version?... Because we all know there is a difference. But the spec sheet doesn't address that. I've used both waxes extensively (1274 and 1343) and cannot tell a difference between the two. I have been told by IGI that the only difference is that each lot of 1274 goes through the one extra step of testing just to make sure it mottles, where the 1343A does not. The 1343N has an additive in it to prevent mottling. By the way, the intensity of mottling will vary with any mottling wax to some degree from lot to lot. The more narrowly a cut is, or the more uniform the molecular weights are of the molecules in the mix, the more intense the mottle will be. Mottling happens because of a great deal of organization of a bunch of molecules which are able to form a crystal lattice. That's why if you mix two mottling waxes of different melting points (different molecular weights), you'll often end up with a wax that won't mottle (non-homogeneous mixture). Mixing 1343a and 1274 still produces a mottling wax, suggesting very close, if not identical, molecular weights. Are these fully mottled candles made from 1343 or 1274?

If you ever manage to get through checkout with something that is out of stock, we'll call you and/or email you as soon as we are processing the order. It does happen from time to time with the sample packs. But if you look at the FO page, it'll indicate if something is known to be out of stock. Hope that helps. Cheers, Alan

I think your questions are very reasonable as a prospective customer, and myself being a representative of Peak appreciate the opportunity to respond. Email response times average about 30 minutes during work days. That doesn't include weekends. Every now and then, one will slip through the cracks, but we try our best to avoid that. And Mondays in particular can take a couple of hours because it is typically the busiest day of the week for us. But we have a toll free number that you are always more than welcome to use for any reason whatsoever, including tech support. In peak times, and as we enter the holiday season, those toll-free lines too can become bogged down from time to time, but you'll notice that we are very responsive to any messages left via voicemail and will call you back ASAP. As far as inventory levels... if we could predict order volume every single month with absolute precision, we'd be really amazing. As it stands, we project inventory levels based on 30-45 day moving averages coupled with production times. But that can be faulty during times of growth, or accelerated sales. Recently we had a discounted wax sale that far exceeded what we expected for midsummer. Midsummer is usually the slowest period of the year, for everybody I think. That wax sale though drove a lot more than just inventory in wax. It was coupled with accelerated depletion of FO's and a number of other items that we stock. It is something we've made notes on and will try to project better in the future. When taking advantage of a wax sale, chandlers will order many other things. Lesson learned for us. Another thing worth mentioning while were talking about inventory levels is that during the summer we do try to keep FO inventory low to keep rotations within that 30-45 day window. FOs can degrade at elevated temperatures. During times of heat spells like we experienced in July, it can be a real challenge to regulate warehouse temperatures. One of the first things we began running out of stock on, in addition to wax during the sale, was the FOs (bad crystal ball). One person even counted it to be 44 at one point. That's a lot by any standard, and something we would have rather avoided. But it happened, and production and transportation of replacement inventory took some time. We've permitted back-orders on FO's on this occasion so that people could still take advantage of volume discounts, when we normally don't handle any back-orders. And we attempted to keep everyone posted on an individual basis as to the status of their back-orders. We know chandlers often have a commitment to their customers to produce within a time frame, and we tried to relay as much information as possible to allow people the option of seeking other sources if a paramount deadline was approaching. And, you may be wondering at this point why we don't usually accept back-orders. In a nutshell, it is because we would screw it up if we had to do it on a regular basis. We don't have a computerized system to track back-orders and it is an entirely manual process. The costs of secondary or tertiary shipments is also prohibitive. In addition, when we do run out of stock on something, typical restocking time is less seven working days. And 98% of orders are being processed within one working day. Managing back-orders with these figures isn't really practical. We'd rather give people the heads-up on the inventory status and the opportunity to shop around if time constraints dictate. Speaking of time constraints, what we'll do is avoid surprising you with a partial fill of your order, or shipping an order two or three weeks after it was placed. We'll always make every attempt possible to notify you of any delays, even before you place an order (with notices on individual items). Our website is updated multiple times per day to accurately reflect any inventory changes, and prevent any surprises that might leave you in a jam. We'd rather prevent you from ordering something that is out-of-stock than to have you learn about it some time later when you receive your order. It's just the way we've always done it. I think it is important to the success of your own business to trust any supplier you are doing business with to come through for you to your expectations. I would encourage you to shop around a bit to find a supplier you are comfortable with. There are many good ones out there. And the good ones will work to earn your business. Cheers, Alan

For those waiting on 1554, look into 1260 instead. I've just learned that 1554 can no longer be produced because one of the feedstocks used to make it is no longer available. The properties of 1260 are very close to 1554. :smiley2: