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TOPs or anyone please help wick won't go out on pillar


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since you were so wonderful in teaching me how to wick a pillar and close up the hole with one piece of tape , I am hoping you could tell me what to do with this . I burned a pillar to the end. Not a great shell by any means but no blow out. :yay:any way I forgot it was burning and just went down to close up the house for the night . It was still burning . it burned right through the bottom and was burning in a pile of melted wax. when I put it out there was a huge hole in the bottom ( wax leaked out every where ). the wick did not go out though. what should I have done to make sure the wick goes out. .

PS If I am babbling please excuse me I am on medication for a herniated disc in my neck :P

Edited by lrbd
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I don't do palm, so I don't have experience with what happens if the bottom of the candle blows out and the wax drains abruptly. What I would normally do is cut the wick short of the bottom before doing the final wax pour--that way it falls over and drowns in the melt pool before the candle burns down too far. In the case of palm candles, maybe it will drown out before the melt pool blows out the bottom.

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are you saying not to use a wick tab?

Wick tabs are for container candles; I wouldn't use one in a pillar. But in this case I think the wick was molded into the candle.

It's not good for the wax to melt down to the bottom of the pillar. It's always possible the candle is sitting directly on the furniture instead of on a plate. Cutting the wick short of the bottom helps ensure it will extinguish before that happens.

With palm candles it sounds as though we have the added possibility that the melt pool will suddenly drain, leaving nothing to drown the wick. That's if I understand what happened.

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Cutting the wick short of the bottom helps ensure it will extinguish before that happens.
Kinda hard to do that with a wick that's molded with the candle... which is one of the many reasons I use wick pins: I can insert any length of wick I choose into the candle.

I use wick assemblies (wick with wicktabs) in pillars. I used to recess the wicktab into the bottom of the pillar, which did not ALWAYS prevent the wick from sucking liquid fuel from under the wicktab because the meltpool of palm pillars is generally around 1/4"-3/8" in depth with a hard bottom (not soft like paraffin or soy) and the neck on most wicktabs is not that high. A dot of high-temp silicone gasket sealer sealing the wick on the bottom of the wick tab totally prevents this. This is the procedure I now use and have not had any problem with self-extinguishing failures since. I still recess the wicktab so that it is embedded into the candle because I want to force the candle to self-extinguish with about 1" of wax remaining.

It's always possible the candle is sitting directly on the furniture instead of on a plate.
Possible? Sure. But I cannot be responsible nor design for every shade of "stupid." People do plenty of foolish crap like placing a candle directly on furniture, near drapes, low enough to catch their kid's ponytail on fire, etc. A person who burns a candle without a non-flammable, insulating barrier of some sort between the candle base and the surface on which it is set is a fool and an accident waiting to happen. As far as I am concerned, ANYONE who does this has voided their right to any safety complaint about a candle. Besides the obvious fire hazard, the FO in a candle will strip nearly any kind of furniture finish. FO is a real good solvent! Again, only a fool would put a candle directly on furniture.
when I put it out there was a huge hole in the bottom (wax leaked out every where).
In the case of palm wax, I never recommend burning pillars on a "normal" candle plate because a blowout easily overruns a normal candle plate. Palm wax is far "runnier" than either paraffin or soy wax. I go one step further and recommend burning palm pillars in a glass hurricane with a layer of sand (or water) in the bottom as best practice or at least an inflammable flat-bottomed bowl. If the surface is rounded, there is airspace under the wick where the wick can simply burn through and allow the MP to empty underneath (I learned this the hard way ;)). If the wick does not self-extinguish and the melt pool empties, the sand stops the leak quickly and the wick will self-extinguish soon after, whether tabbed or not. Any flare-up is contained inside the glass hurricane.
With palm candles it sounds as though we have the added possibility that the melt pool will suddenly drain
This can happen with any pillar regardless of wax type. All it takes is a blowout due to uneven burning (drafts, inattention, etc.) or for the wick to burn down far enough to allow the wax to escape the melt pool.
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Here's what we do since we've chosen to not use stick pins in our pillars. We cut the wick as short as we can and then pour a wax cap to cover the wick. This allows a base for the wick to sit on and allows it to snuff out on its own so it won't melt through at the bottom of the candle . I hope that made sense.

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Kinda hard to do that with a wick that's molded with the candle...

Uh, no. You snip the wick and do your second pour.

Things is, you have have to keep that editing function alive in your brain, so that the creative exhuberance of handcrafting doesn't teeter over into goofball. That is what's happened when you start describing designs where wick sustainer bases are craftily encased inside a pillar. Most things you can accomplish with a rube goldberg scheme can also be accomplished in a simple, conventional way.

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You snip the wick and do your second pour.
I don't second pour palm wax. The only time I pour more than once is when making layers or tilties.
Most things you can accomplish with a rube goldberg scheme can also be accomplished in a simple, conventional way.
Maybe it doesn't work for you with your palm wax pillars, but it works very well for me. This way I don't have to keep all kinds/sizes of wicking only used for one purpose. I can use more readily available wick assemblies which I can use in many different applications. AND it absolutely self-extinguishes, which pleases me. :) Edited by Stella1952
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I would never, never ever burn a palm pillar or any pillar if it was not in some kind of container, glass ashtray, tin plate, etc. carole

well me neither but there are wack a doodles out there who might:p

nothing surprises me

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:confused: would you mind explaining that for me

Absolutely. We noticed on a few of the pillars we poured that when they get down to the very bottom (and yes, they are always on a plate of some sort), that the wick would keep burning and the bottom would get soft becuase of the hot melted wax. If you pick the candle up or slid in the plate, it would leave melted wax where the wick is. Once when I picked the candle up, melted wax stuck on the plate where the wick was and it left a hole in the bottom of the candle and wax leaked all over the plate. It wasn't much wax since it was at the end of the candle, but I don't want a customer experiencing this should they pick up or move their candle at the end of the burn.

To alleviate this, what we've been doing is, before we unmold the candle, we cut the wick as short as we can. We then do a repour of sorts with extra wax left from the pour and pour a very thin layer of wax on the bottom of the candle to cover the wick. This gives the candle a bit more wax underneath the wick to provide a wax "cushion" for the wick to sit on and keep it from melting all the way through. It seals the wick in. We've only been doing this on the last couple of batches we poured, but so far, with the candles we've been able to burn all the way down, its worked like a charm.

Edited by Meridith
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Yes, we are using palm but we TRY to do this before the candle is all the way set up so it won't run down the sides. If the candle is set up, we pour very carefully. Sometimes, if trying for a more rustic look, I don't mind if it runs down the sides. I love the rustic look and visual textures we've gotten with the tortoise shell. I'll try later to post some pictures so you can see. I'll show ones where I waited too long and ones that you can't even tell we did another pour on the bottom.

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thank you so much . I am having a blast with the artistic effects . I am pretty pleased with how they are looking for just learning pillar candles. however what good are they if I can't burn them correctly. I get blow outs mid way and now that I got one to burn all the way it blows out at the bottom:angry2:

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We are having alot of fun with this too and are pretty new at it. We've had a few blow-outs but none really bad. Our blow-outs have mainly been where we just get a small slit in the wax with a little wax seepage, but then the candle burns right past it with no problems. But a blow out is a blow out and we continue with our testing with the next wicks and wick sizes to ensure no more blow-outs regardless of how small. Our testing has actually been easier than I thought it would be. I'm excited for when I can get them on the shelves to sell. I'm having a friend custom make all our candle plates too. They will all be locally made and be unique.

BTW - we've noticed our blow outs have mostly occurred where we got a bit heavy handed with the dye. We tried to create tye-dyed effects in our candles. It did not work like we planned. It seems as though the colorants weakened the wax.

Edited by Meridith
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Here's some that we poured a "cap" on. I had these on my computer but I'll try to get a few more examples posted. When I took these pictures, I wasn't trying to show the cap but I think you can get the idea. With each of these, we were trying to get more rustic, Zen type looks to the candle and were just playing around having fun.

The first is one I wanted all my layers to kind of flow into each other so that there was no definite line. You can see a bit of a different color on the bottom of this candle but you can't feel or see a line. Its a fine line of green color.

The middle candle is one where it ran down the sides. I initially wanted it to run all the way down the candle, but it didn't. At first I did not like it but I actually ended up liking the look.

The last one is one where we saved a bit of wax and poured the cap trying to not let it be visible. I liked how the wax cracked and the look we got. DH did an over pour on the top part and let it run down over the top of the candle.

4th pic is the top of the 3rd candle showing how the wax ran down and formed around the top.

With each of these candles, we poured into cool molds and did not insulate the candle to slow down the cooling down process. We poured at different temps too.

We have only burned the last one. We did have a small blowout on the top but so far its burning nicely. We're using CSN 12's in the current batch we poured. They've been burning nicely for the most part but have burned a bit too hot on a few of them which might have contributed to those blow-outs. We haven't added any steric acid but will with our next batch of testers to see if it helps.

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thanks so much . last night I made one .nothing fancy .one color and for the first time I added the Palm Stearic Acid. I used 1 Tablespoon per pound as stella suggested. I cut the wick down after wrecking and did a mini re-pour. an little went dow the sides . that made me mad. But holy crap it slid out of the mold so easy . that was a nice change for me. I too used a CDN 12 . will have to see how it goes. Thanks again for sharing

PS I love the rustic look

Edited by lrbd
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thanks so much . last night I made one .nothing fancy .one color and for the first time I added the Palm Stearic Acid. I used 1 Tablespoon per pound as stella suggested. I cut the wick down after wrecking and did a mini re-pour. an little went dow the sides . that made me mad. But holy crap it slid out of the mold so easy . that was a nice change for me. I too used a CDN 12 . will have to see how it goes. Thanks again for sharing

PS I love the rustic look

We've never had even one candle stick on our molds. We've never used steric and we've never treated our molds. Even when I used a mold for the first time the candle came right out. I'm just waiting for the day though cuz I know it will happen. :tongue2:

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