small melt pool

[henhao]

I am just getting started with candle-making and I have a few questions.

I am using parrafin blend wax, a 3 x 7 mold with a wickpin and some 9" large wicks which say they are for candles 3-4" inches in diameter.

First candle went well, but I noticed that the wickpin left a hole a little bit wider than my wicks, so that there is a little empty space between the wick and the candle. Is this something I need to be concerned about?

While making my second candle I noticed that the wickpin was off-center after pouring, so tried to adjust it before the second pour in a make-shift way, using a rubberband, so it would be in the center. Since the wax had hardened a bit by this time, it left a gap in the center, which I thought would fill on the second pour, but which apparently did not fill in!

The second candle is the only one I have tried burning so far. The melt pool is very small: not quite 1 inch in diamater, on a 3 inch candle. After burning for a little bit the candle drowned in wax in the pool.

I'm trying to figure out exactly what went wrong.

Is this because the wicks are too thin? or because of the problem I had when making the second candle? or both? Is there anything I can do now to make the candle burn properly, so that there will be a wider melt pool?

About how wide a melt pool should one expect on a 3" candle?

Thanks for your help -- and any tips would be appreciated.

[Vicky_CO]

We have several problems here.

First is we need to know

What wax?

What wick?

What FO?

How much FO?

Any additives?

These are need to know in order to be able to help you

[Starr]

Hey Vicky, could we put a sticky up with a "please be sure to give this info if you're asking for help with a problem" type of thing???

[henhao]

Hi Vicky,

Thanks for your reply.

I ordered most of my supplies from Natures Garden. I'm using their parafin blend wax, and 1/2 ounce of their "cocoa cabana" fragrance oil (which has "candlepro.com" written on the label).

Since I ordered the wrong sized wicks from them I had to go to a crafts store, where I picked up Yaley 9" pre-waxed large bleached wicks.

No additives.

Update on candle: I burned it for three hours. At some point it stopped drowning in its own wick and kept burning. But I'm still not sure if I'm getting a wide enough meltpool or not? And although I'm trying to keep the wick straight, it seems to burn unevenly, always tending toward one side, though there is no draft.

Another thing: on my third pour I ended up going over the top of the other two pours by mistake, when I was trying to fill in the area left behind from moving the wick pin. Could this also have something to do with the uneven melting?

[Vicky_CO]

Hey Vicky, could we put a sticky up with a "please be sure to give this info if you're asking for help with a problem" type of thing???

Tried that before it did not help so we unstickied it.

No one ever looks at the stickied threads.

[Vicky_CO]

Hi Vicky,

Thanks for your reply.

I ordered most of my supplies from Natures Garden. I'm using their parafin blend wax, and 1/2 ounce of their "cocoa cabana" fragrance oil (which has "candlepro.com" written on the label).

Since I ordered the wrong sized wicks from them I had to go to a crafts store, where I picked up Yaley 9" pre-waxed large bleached wicks.

No additives.

Update on candle: I burned it for three hours. At some point it stopped drowning in its own wick and kept burning. But I'm still not sure if I'm getting a wide enough meltpool or not? And although I'm trying to keep the wick straight, it seems to burn unevenly, always tending toward one side, though there is no draft.

I think your wick is the problem. You are working with a soy/paraffin mix and you will need to wick up I would start with 30ply, possibily a RRD 50 maybe and LX 22 to 24. If you wanted to use a square braid I would start with a #1 or #2.

You really need some sample packs of wicks so you have several sizes to play with.