Soy Melting

[Lorelei]

I need to ask a question about melting soy in a presto.

If we melt more than we need at the time, (No FO added) will it harm the soy to let it set back and remelt it again for the next time?

I've not worked with soy before so I wanted to make sure I could do this.

[Gdawg]

I do that, every now and then tho I do let it run out so I can clean the bottom of the pot good and make sure no dust/particals are in there. I store it with the lid on after it cools

[scifichik]

I need to ask a question about melting soy in a presto.

If we melt more than we need at the time, (No FO added) will it harm the soy to let it set back and remelt it again for the next time?

I've not worked with soy before so I wanted to make sure I could do this.

It won't hurt a thing to do it that way.

[MissMori]

I took a candle making class before I started and I asked the same question. The instructor said you don't want to remelt too many times, maybe 3 or 4 is ok. Soy wax, all waxes in fact, are hard oils. Like any oil, with repeated heating, it will break down chemically and may begin to smell off and will not perform up to par. You also don't want to heat it too much higher than recommended by the manufacturer. Super heating will affect the wax in the same way.

Think of it as cooking oil. When you heat a cooking oil to the smoke point, you are changing it chemically and if you keep it around, you will notice that it goes rancid faster than oils that have not been used or heated to the smoke point.

But what do I know, I've only made 3 candles.

[Lorelei]

Thanks all for the great responses

[EricofAZ]

One more response. I read on this forum that if you turn on the presto with a wax layer in it, the wax melts and superheats under the layer and you get a bit of a blast of a mess out of it. I don't know how volatile this is, but I did notice one time that the wax did superheat from below and when I broke the top, it expelled some hot liquid. Be careful about that.

Edited October 5, 2010 by EricofAZ