TallTayl

My replies align with Jcandle above. Supplier makes a difference in how much you need to add. Some are just not as strongly compounded as others. One place my FO comes from can blow you away at 2-3% in wax. Why add more if you do not need it? My profits prefer using less. Wicking is about the most important variable IME. No matter what wick or wax combo, the burning characteristics need to be working well together to perform well.

I collected every strawberry out there last year. None smell like a strawberry. All have that chemically note, many smelled like a really old tube of Bonnie bell lip gloss, and they morphed into something else in CP. Candybee is right, it is a holy grail.

I found that the water dispersible titanium dioxide giveS the crackle effect more than oil dispersible.well, with the brands I have used anyway. Every brand and supplier may be slightly different.

I sub out some beeswax for candelila. Carnauba, or other higher melt point lip safe waxes will do the same, you'll need to tinker with proportions. While more beeswax may make your stick less melt prone, it may also make the lip balm go on draggy, especially when temps begin to cool. Cocoa butter, kokum, shea, and other butters high in stearic acid (what makes them seem harder) will have a tendency to go grainy when exposed to heat and cooling (like in purses that are in hot cars, then cool houses). Plus, harder feeling butters may not necessarily have higher melting points.

Not all titanium dioxide is the same. Different treatments to make it water and/or oil soluble react strangely with soap. Just about all TiO2 causes acceleration in my soap formulas.

tetrasodium EDTA is a chelator that helps bind metal and other ions. In hard water it helps makes your soap more bubbly and cuts soap scum. In soap it helps stave off rancidity a while longer than soap without it.

Your bakers calculation above is correct. Seriously, i would look into a traditional scale. It is simple enough to make mistakes without an extra layer of calculations. The KD7000 scale has been a work horse for me. I got 7 years out of my last one. And it measures in grams in addition to ounces so small batches are a snap. Edited to add, are you sure your current scale does not have a setting switch or tiny button somewhere to make it work like a traditional scale?

Pick a wax YOU want to work with. You can never please everyone. I specialize in beeswax pillars, tapers, etc., but it is a super small market. Makes it more of a labor of love when the wax itself really fluctuates in quality and price. I make them just because i love them. I also offer soy container and palm (containers and pillars). So long as I love what I make, the people in my market love it too. It all comes down to how you market your candles.

I weigh the typical bottles and use that as the Tare weight. Depending on the specific gravity an ounce can vary greatly in volume! A popular supplier was busted several times over the past year or two for selling in weight, but filling to volume and counting the container into the weight. So someone buying a lb of say coconut oil was getting 14 weighed ounces or less. Their defense? It was an oil therefore measured by volume. Too bad that is not how it works. Edited to add, places like WSP sell fragrances by fluid ounce as posted in the listing. The MSDS/CoA links publish the specific gravity. You need to do some simple math to figure out how many weighed ounces are in that bottle. NDA sells by fluid ounce for anything under a kilo, then by weight above a kilo. It took a long while for me to figure out which vendors measure how and under what circumstances.

[hijack] EDTA is a super additive for hard water. It allows for mega bubbles in many simple soap formulas. Too bad the "all natural" crowd has eschewed such simple additives and forced them out of favor. And it sure can help delay rancidity! [/ hijack]

So so so true about the tins. Anyone who wicks for FMP on the first burn or two finds they can get into trouble toward the end.

I would't say your math is incorrect, OG, just one of the two common ways people interpret it. The suppliers are not really clear.

I a,m about to roll them out at my Summer Faire. I figure enough people there will be happy to give me an opinion

I would try different wick series before adding new oils if the wax is not the problem. The only hypothesis i have had about adding coconut oil or the host of other things people suggest, is that it changes the melt point of their wax/wick/container, etc combo enough to combust differently. Also, i read often on facebook groups that people tend to over scent and over wick to try to achieve good throw. Sometimes that has the opposite effect. Let those candles sit for a few weeks/months and light later. You may be surprised.

Dr Bronners liquid 'Castile' is a blend of coconut oil, hemp and olive oil. The thin viscosity tells me there's not a lot of olive in there, and that it is greatly diluted with water. Pure olive oil liquid soap can be as thick as soft soap brand in the pump, or thin like water depending on how much water was added to dilute, or sometimes which fragrances were used. Coconut oil liquid soap is usually very thin in consistency. A blend can make a big difference. As said in a post above, any hand made soap can be good, it comes down to personal preference of the entire blend, not just a single oil. Olive oil bar soap, for instance, with no other oils can be considered very mild, but has lather qualities that repulse some people. Coconut oil only can be very cleansing, or can make some people very happy. A blend of the two with or without other oils gains a nice synergy. I would suggest trying as many as you can to see what you like. Craft shows in your area will likely have plenty to choose from without having to pay shipping. You'll soon discover qualities you love and can narrow your search easily.

Over the last two days i have received many shipments from different suppliers. The way two were packaged made me look extra hard at the contents. Yesterday i received an order of big tea light cups that were bagged in plastic shopping bags. I ordered 400 and saw 5 bags. Thought oh no they shipped too many, but then noticed all the bags were at different fill levels. Sat and counted to find i was short 16 pieces. Today i opened a shipment that was so horribly packaged i was tempted to send it back. 500 regular tea light cups all loose in the box with 10 other items including fragile molds and equipment with nothing to separate anything. A wad of paper was shoved on top. Counted those cups and found short 29. Now these i have an order for, so had i not had some on the shelf from another supplier i would be out of luck. Have read a lot of complaints on facebook groups about being shorted oils, fragrances, etc. reminds me that we have to be absolutely diligent about Receiving things thoroughly. By Receiving, I mean having a standard process to count, tag and stock. My normal process on small items is to weigh 10-25 units and then weigh the whole batch doing the quick math to see if it is close enough. Things are often within a few grams. These were both off by hundreds of grams Also highlights that our own packaging to our customers could cause that same sort of inquiry by our customers. A wee bit of care and i would not have thought twice about either order. Would have been puzzled later, but none the wiser.

Their ingredient listing on the web site leaves a lot to be desired :/ , as does the sodium chloride use as "stabilizing" comment. Means nothing with regard to making safe and stable bath and body products. If you want to make a true cream soap, there's a Yahoo Group called Cream Soap that is still active and very skilled.

Dunno.... I use a small scoop to add a small amount of mica and/or glitter, then lightly tap or open/close the jaws to make it flow.

Potassium cocoate is the result of making liquid soap paste from potassium hydroxide and coconut oil (and water to dissolve the KOH). Actually the ingredients in that listing look like a blend of liquid soap paste, melt and pour soap and coconut puree. in my opinion and experience, that will not be the greatest formula in the world and will be prone to microbial growth. Do you have the full recipe available with their suggested phases of procedure? All of the cream soap i have made started with a blend of sodium hydroxide, potassium hydroxide, liquid and base oils. It requires lots of stearic acid and many phases of steps to create. The long rot period is needed to complete saponification in each step. You can come close without all the hard calculations or lye handling using a mix of bar soap and liquid soap paste. You will need to heat them both, whip like heck and tinker with proportions.

Some folks seem happy to be unhappy about everything and don't mine spreading their version of joy. You can't please everyone, but I'm sure you have pleased plenty with your kind gesture of fragrance sample. The majority who have liked a sample scent may have later purchased something they otherwise would not just based on that sample On the other hand, that customer just got a huge gift.... She now knows a fragrance not to actually spend money toward to see if she likes it

IMO, if the supplier has discontinued a fragrance blend, or has gone out of business without providing the code to another retailer it becomes fair game. On the other hand, duplicating an actively available retailed fragrance to hopefully get a cheaper knockoff is not so clear cut. I would not feel right about that. A WS customer of mine has tried unsuccessfully to have my personal custom blends duped... I spent a small fortune plus years creating them. I really dislike being (what i feel) is stolen from. Dupes are not always spot on, nor do they always perform the same as the original, so it's always a risk. All that said, i have had a few long discontinued fragrances duped and am very happy i did. Edited to add, another grey area is having a fragrance duped to remove phthalates. If the original is not available phthalate free with no plan to become made phthalate free, then the dupe is on this side of that grey line letting me sleep at night. The dupe will never match the original since phthalates do make the original and duped scent different.

I use the wide end of a chopstick and go just about all the way to the bottom of a container. For pillars, same tool, i poke into the molten middle. When you do the fill pour, make the wax hot enough to not solidify immediately upon hitting the cold wax in the candle.

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/46956800/ This is the one i use and it is perfect with any size mica or glitter or combo.

SKS, candle science or specialty bottle. They are all slightly different. Candle science has feet And are lined. The others do not.

It could have a higher melt point making it stand straighter in a wax with a lower mp.