Wick Testing

[TallTayl]

I learned this testing technique from wick companies. It’s so easy to compare side by side, photo by photo/video.

 

the next step is, of course, within each vessel you intend to use. Size, shape, material all play a part. Having the baseline wick down eliminates having to make one container for each and every wick brand and size out there when you know certain ones won’t work at all. I can’t count how many times I took someone else’s word for the perfect wick and it just did not burn well in my wax. Wait, I probably can if I spread out the candles in the graveyard. Hundreds. Placed end to end the containers would easily cover my driveway. 

 

Then when testing with fragrance, I pick a common, inexpensive, predictable one that I don’t mind smelling for a long while and use it in all burn tests in the next round.  I try to use The same bottle of fragrance in every single test. Sometimes this takes months from start to finish when learning a new wax. When that scent is done, the next fragrance is easy.  The next even easier. Isolating variables is the fastest, cheapest, most reliable way to get a product to market. 

[birdcharm]

12 hours ago, Forrest said:

I'm going to do one to help me fit my wicks into a progression in my wax. For example, I need something bigger than a CD10 but smaller than a CD12 for my 11oz tureens. So I hope to end up with a list of smallest to largest wicks. Now you may say that it won't be accurate in real world situations because the results will depend on the container I'm trying to wick, which is true; however, it will be a starting point, which is more than I have now. Plus it may be of some help to all the nice 6006 users on the board that have helped me so much.

 

So my neighbor tells me she's going to pick up some glasses and would like me to make some candles for her ... we've done this before ... but, what does she bring me?  Among some simple jelly jars and wide glasses, some little jars that look like a beehive and ... guess what? ... tureens!!   

 

For me, it's more efficient to go with what I already know regarding wicks I've become familiar with and see what they do in the container.  If I just needed to see the melt pool size or how a wick performs in itself, that would be different, or if it was for pillar candles.  But, for container candles with container wax, I need to see how it's going to perform within the container I'll be using.  I need to test this little beehive jar (as well as tureen) and I'll half fill it with two different sample wicks, this should tell me how it's going to burn at the widest point.  Since selecting a wick for the widest point is part of the deal, and the walls of the glass play a critical role in all of this, I can't seem to understand how a tray test would tell me anything more than melt pool size when not in a container and wick personality when not in a container.  Again, I can see how it works in a process of elimination, etc., but as for a true test, to really see how it burns in the container, I think that tells you more about it and you get to burn a candle, even if it doesn't burn right.  It's just my own opinion.

[Forrest]

11 hours ago, birdcharm said:

 

So my neighbor tells me she's going to pick up some glasses and would like me to make some candles for her ... we've done this before ... but, what does she bring me?  Among some simple jelly jars and wide glasses, some little jars that look like a beehive and ... guess what? ... tureens!!   

 

For me, it's more efficient to go with what I already know regarding wicks I've become familiar with and see what they do in the container.  If I just needed to see the melt pool size or how a wick performs in itself, that would be different, or if it was for pillar candles.  But, for container candles with container wax, I need to see how it's going to perform within the container I'll be using.  I need to test this little beehive jar (as well as tureen) and I'll half fill it with two different sample wicks, this should tell me how it's going to burn at the widest point.  Since selecting a wick for the widest point is part of the deal, and the walls of the glass play a critical role in all of this, I can't seem to understand how a tray test would tell me anything more than melt pool size when not in a container and wick personality when not in a container.  Again, I can see how it works in a process of elimination, etc., but as for a true test, to really see how it burns in the container, I think that tells you more about it and you get to burn a candle, even if it doesn't burn right.  It's just my own opinion.

In the final analysis it always comes down to wax, wick, container and FO. I’ll skip the environmental factors because all of my perfectly wicked candles are tunneling in my cold bedroom these days. My wick test only tells me is the size of the MPs the wicks produce under the test conditions and how they compare to each other. For an inexperienced candle maker, like me, it will provide guidance in choosing wicks to for testing. It won’t give you an answer, but it can provide some guidance.

BTW I didn’t have good luck testing half full tureens. I found that the best wick was the smallest one that would burn all the wax. So there was always wax on the side above the level of the MP until you get near the bottom. When you fill half way you don’t have that wax. I ended up testing about three quarters full, and that worked better for me.

[TallTayl]

In my early tests last year I discovered the problematic soy.  so counting myself lucky on timing even though I “thought” I knew that wax 😳🤭

 

the other good outcome is I tried wicks that normally get pushed aside. Discovered my optimal wick was ECO, a brand I had discarded years before when learning 464 and 415. I hated their performance so much they were never even tested in my later waxes. This discovery got me through an entire season of faires and wholesale when otherwise I would have not had a safe, reliable product to sell.