JanetsCandles

It does, but what I'm wanting to do is have an orange colored base, I'm using pumpkin in it, but I'll be removing part of the base recipe first for coloring white and black. So I'd be boosting the orange color with the paprika infused oil, but the rest would be without the paprika or pumpkin.

I'm in an experimenting mood, so here's a question that I haven't figured out yet on my own (even after searching). Say I wanted to infuse an oil for colorant in a soap batch. How would I figure it in on my lye calculations? I have seen that most people just say to hold it out of your base oils in measurement, but I am using Soap Calc for the lye portion (and seeing my numbers), so would I just hold it out as part of one of the base oils? I want to infuse some paprika in oil for the color, but really don't want to screw up a batch of soap over it.

TIA!

How bad is this going to end up? My recipe:

35% OO (Pomace)

35% Lard

10% Shea Butter

10% Castor Oil

10% Sunflower Oil (High Oleic)

Superfat@ 5%, full water

Today I unwrapped the soap to check on it, and I've got beads of (what I think is) glycerine on top. Yes, it's warm here, ditto on humid in the house because we use an evaporative cooler (swamp cooler) for the house instead of traditional A/C. The droplets aren't oily, or smelly. I am trying to double check to make sure I don't have a horrible mess on my hands. I can't pull it from the mold yet because it is still a little softer than I would like. I was able to wipe up the droplets from the top, none have reappeared yet, but Aack! *insert pulling hair out emoticon here*

You guys have done awesome with that style. They look really good! I'm wondering how my "tweak" is going to come out of the mold.

Heya, Cinder. They look pretty good. With the feather palm, you don't have to wait until it's fully cooled before turning it. It does need a crust on the top that you have poured, but not a very thick one. That wax is awesome for making "ombre" style layers, by the way. The thinner the crust, the more likely the first color will bleed into the next color. If that doesn't bother you, you can make some interesting color patterns that way. If you don't want them that particular way, you could test with a heat gun against the side to see if you can get it to expand a little, then have it kick off again but not wait so long to pour your second layer.

I'm using both 1/2 ounce and 1 ounce bottles. They don't have droppers, but I have some of the LDPE pipette droppers I'm packaging with the glass bottles, so they can have a dropper for it. That way, no leaking during shipping, I can tape the top of the bottles, and it's just less hassle for me to include a dropper that won't break off.

Here's how to check a thermometer's temperature reading either with boiling water or ice and water. It's also got the temp readings for altitude variations. http://foodsafety.unl.edu/haccp/helpful/thermcalibration

Your thermometer should be within a 2 degree variance in either direction of your target temperature.

I mixed a bit of Matte Woodland Green pigment with Titanium Dioxide (ratio of about 2 to 1) in oil to rehydrate and mixed in the soap. Not sure what color it'll turn out to be when it all sets, just because it isn't dry yet.

And of course, I'm posting immediately after cleanup. Can't wait to see how this one turned out.

I used Candlewic's OakMoss (and didn't have a bit of problem with acceleration or anything else, yay!)

I sorta started out doing the impressionist swirl thing, then sorta went into the peacock swirl thing, and said, oh well, I like it, it's pretty. (The mold, I made myself.) Will post pictures when it comes out of the mold.

I use Smooth-on as well, but use the PMC series of polyurethane in most of my molds. Have a set that has been used at least 5 days out of the week, multiple pours per day, for the last 3 years. Yep yep. You'd want to go probably with the PMC- 121-30 liquid. It does have to be mixed fairly well, but is easy to work with.

I'm actually packaging mine in amber glass bottles. You should be able to use LDPE or HDPE bottles for it though.

Try doing it while color blind. WOWSERS! Though I have been pretty accurate with Red, Blue, Yellow, Black, and Brown (cause, honestly, how the H*** do you make BROWN?!)

Yup! I'm shade Red/Green colorblind, and certain shades get awfully problematic for me. I'm glad my DH is here, and doesn't mind correcting me if I miss. LOL

I usually use Lonestar and Peak for my liquid dyes. I ended up having to get French Color to formulate my red for me, because none of the others were quite right. All of them were too blue for the color I ended up needing.

I have my soft wax in a big trash can liner in the house right now. Mostly because I had it out in the garage, with the side slit, and it decided to ooze all over stuff, then cool overnight to form a Chernobyl-esque elephant's foot over my clothes dryer. Oh that was fun to clean up. The cases of harder wax (slabs) are still in the box, in my candle making cabinet. The opened case gets busted up and put into a big rubbermaid tub that I've modified the lid for quick access on. I'm not using enough Palm wax to justify anything other than the bags it comes in yet.

Do you guys make simmering oils for lamp warmers or potpourri warmers? I'm curious how well they sell for you guys.

I bought a pack of 6 condiment bottles at Sam's for something like $7.97.

That's where I got mine. I ended up cutting the tips to be a bit wider, but the ones I got from Sam's club are wide opening neck type, which is nice for cleaning.

I don't like canola in general. Don't even like it in cooking. The smell of the stuff makes me gag. (Which is weird, you wouldn't think that it would smell different than vegetable oil, but somehow it does to me.)

I've been having trouble with most of the recipes using CO or Palm actually tracing far too quickly for my liking. With the info you guys just gave, I'm thinking of running the color idea in a Bastille 90% OO/ 10% Castor Oil recipe. Figuring that should give me enough time to work with it. Either that or trade out the CO and the Palm for Lard and see how well that one works.

"Cheap" and candle making for a business aren't supposed to go into the same sentence lol. It's a lot like being a mad chemist, pyro, accountant, salesman, researcher, and businessman all at the same time. You're looking at a minimum of $5K to start up a business like this. That's for supplies: manufacturing equipment, any molds, fragrance oils, wax, wicks, colorant, etc. I say 5K because you have to test before you even THINK of selling one. It can take months for a single candle. And each type of wax has its own challenges.

As for the starter kit you linked, I'm not familiar with that company at all. But you aren't going to master this with just 4 jars and some wicks. I would suggest looking at other suppliers first and comparing what they have. Another thing to think about is that each company's fragrance oils are going to act differently in different waxes. Start with wax preference first. Then figure out what you want to offer on your first fragrance oil. Then work on testing those combinations. And in the meantime, read, read, read. Go to the library, or use google to find basic candle making instructions. It all sounds easy, but in practice, not so much.

Most of us have been doing this for a long time, but I'm sure everyone will agree that sometimes things go wonky on all of us. If a fragrance oil changes formula, it burns differently, for example. Same with waxes.

Another thought: get a good digital scale if you plan on doing any of this. The kit you linked doesn't have one. You will need it. Don't ever trust a kit or supplier to be 100% accurate on weights of product. They will occasionally make a mistake, so you HAVE to measure everything for yourself to be sure. Otherwise your recipe ends up skewed. If you ever took a chemistry class, it's very similar. You have to keep notes and be able to reproduce your "experiment" with the same outcome if you want a successful candle line.

Oh, and get something to clean up with. Regular cleaners don't take candle colorant out of tile. Not much does. It's messy in this line of work LOL

I found a recipe on the Soap Queen blog and changed one ingredient. I'm trying to figure out if it will trace too quickly to use it in the squirt bottles. http://www.soapqueen.com/bath-and-body-tutorials/cold-process-soap/impressionist-soap-tutorial/ There's the original recipe. They are showing that it is workable in squirt bottles. I am wanting to change the Canola oil out and use Olive Oil instead. But I'm a bit concerned with having 26% each of Palm and Coconut oils. I've had some problems recently with trace happening quicker than I want with a couple of other recipes, so can anyone tell me how likely this one is to go south on me? I just don't want to get everything set up and then find out that it has to turn into another "spoon swirl" type LOL. TIA!

Ha! No, but I should! LOL

I use the PMC series of urethane on most of my candles. It's from smooth-on as well. Sometimes I do end up with the silicone though, depending on the project.

Most of the supplier sites (I'm talking places like Brambleberry, Magestic Mountain Sage, WSP, ect) should give you info on if a color morphs or not in CP soap. I use the Merlot Mica (from BB) for a red color, and so far haven't had a morph problem. I haven't found any others that work for the color (yet).

The color morph does happen because certain colors don't like a high pH, which happens when you have the lye/fat reactions. Some of the colors actually look like they morph, but they come back to true after they set up. I've got a lavender oxide like that. There are some CP soap colors that are in liquids too, from my understanding. It just sounds like those colors you are using are just not CP stable.

I'm running some fall scents too. I'm doing some Witches' Moon Brew (Halloween blend), starting work on a few of my Dia de los Muertos skulls, finishing up a large unscented order for a wedding, Cornucopia, and White Sage/Cedar, if I can get to it.

I imagine the metal mold would just melt the adhesive. The silicone molds don't get that hot, so it works there.