Wood wicks with little baby flame, long

[peejeeratties]

I have a friend that would like me to try and make some candles with wooden wicks. Sure seems easy since there are only like a few different wooden wicks. Yeah right...

I have the 7 oz straight sided tumbler, with a 2.75" opening. I use GW 464 wax, 6 oz of wax, to .5 oz scent, no color.

Since I order most of my stuff form Bitter Creek, I ordered wicks from there. Their site said that 3 inch opening with soy wax, uses the #3 wick and double them in soy.

Got all excited, made my first candle, so much easier than traditional wick as far as centering and so forth.

Let it set up, trimmed wick to about a quarter of an inch, lit it and had a decent flame until it hit the wax, it stays lit, but it is a baby flame, like barely a flame at all.

Needless to say the melt pool is only about 3/4 of the container after 6 hours of burning. Melted it down, and started over. I tried just one wick instead of 2 just to see what would happen. Same exact results.

For giggles I lit it later, and had a good flame, but not acceptable for someone lighting it for the first time.

Thinking that maybe the wick was too small and thin, the BC wicks tend to separate despite my rigging while setting up. I ordered a bigger size from a different company. These were thicker, about 1/8 inch thick and almost an inch wide.

Take 3, results exactly the same, the wick is at least double the size of the other wicks, and I have the same melt pool and flame size. Now it is making me angry lol.

Oddly enough it gives off excellent hot throw despite the tiny tiny flame.

Any thoughts or ideas? I've read the very very extensive post that someone posted, excellent read btw. tried mimicking them, and blah lol.

Thanks in advance.

[jonsie]

I'm curious about the other "very very extensive post" because I'd like to read it too! And I'm surprised I didn't see your question until now or I would have answered sooner.

I used GW464 with a small percent of palm in 7 oz status/metro jar, FO ~ 6%, and I personally feel two #3s are too wide for that size, but that could be because of the palm I use. I'd go with two #2s just to see if that helps.

I'd also try trimming the wick lower to about 1/8" and see if that helps. Sometimes that extra height just gets in the way of the flame since it can't curl like a CDN.

I only know of two main wooden wicks available, BCN and Unity, but the last time I researched wooden wicks was about a year ago. Of those two, I prefer BCN because they weren't treated with anything. Despite that, I still had trouble getting consistent and steady burns from them. Sometimes, the candle would simply not light even with the benefit of a butane lighter.

[CandleMakinCutiePie]

I have been testing wood wicks for awhile myself but i've only used the ones from Lonestar, because they were the only company that offered a sample pack when I was looking.They come in SM,MED,LG,and XL.They have burned beautifully for me so far in an 8 oz status jars and an 8 oz apothecary jar.If you want to keep experimenting with ww's I suggest trying a different brand.The MED and LG have worked the best for me so far.I get a fmp after about 2 hrs but the jar never gets too hot to touch,(even after burning for 6 hours straight.)The hot throw is usually there,(depending on the f.o)and the crackling is decent depending on how much f.o and dye I use.(It seems like the more dye I use,the louder the crackle is.)Honestly i've had better luck with these wood wicks than any other kind of wicks i've tried!I find it disheartening though that the ones from BC are not working for you because I order some of my wax from there and would love to get more wood wicks from somewhere I regularly order from already.=( O well,I guess you can't have it all right!?Anyways,good luck with your testing.Maybe I will get some from BC anyways and see if I end up with the same troubles!

@Jonsie,here's a link to a pretty extensive ww testing that I found a bit back.Idk if it's the same one peejeeratties is talking about but i found it to be informative.

http://www.craftserver.com/forums/showthread.php?45154-Le-Wicket%99-Wood-Wick-Tests-and-Pics&highlight=wood%20wick