Jaye Posted March 7, 2006 Share Posted March 7, 2006 This may seem like an incredibly silly question to most of you, but I cannot for the life of me figure it out. In every tutorial/instructions on making hurricane shells that I've found, they say to move your weighted-down mold to a water bath after pouring your wax. Why is it that you can't set up the mold with the weights in a water-filled vessel and then pour your wax? This past weekend I was so sick of burning myself and spilling wax everywhere and needing another pair of hands to help me move it (I don't have a hold-a-mold yet!) that I decided to just start in the water-bath. I put my weighted-down mold in a big cauldron filled with luke-warm water in the sink. Once the wax was poured and my photos in place, I turned on the cold water tap to gradually replace the luke-warm. Everything I tried turned out perfectly!!! I did just a plain color (bright orange! ) hurricane first just to see what would happen, followed by two photo embeds and then a chunk embed. They all seem to burn wonderfully with a tealight too! Am I just having beginner's luck and there's a real reason we shouldn't do this? :undecided Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scented Posted March 7, 2006 Share Posted March 7, 2006 Well one reason is because it will immediately start to chill your mold and if you have any air bubbles on the surface, they'll be stuck in place. Additionally, you could fill your water bath up and when you add wax, it is going to displace some of that water. Too much water and you could have water in your wax. Too little water and you could have one of those nice little lines. And running water straight into the water bath increases the risk of water getting into your wax. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaye Posted March 7, 2006 Author Share Posted March 7, 2006 Well one reason is because it will immediately start to chill your mold and if you have any air bubbles on the surface, they'll be stuck in place. I thought of that, and didn't want a "rustic" look on the shell, so started out with lukewarm water, rather than cold. So far, there's been no displacement when adding the wax (the mold is heavily weighted), and my cauldrin is the perfect size... it comes to about half an inch from the top of my mold, so there's no spillage into the wax when I add the cold water. Of course, should I ever use a shorter mold, I'll have to rethink the whole thing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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