We’ve worked diligently to handcraft a clean burning candle for everyone to enjoy. Now for you to get the full benefits in your home, we’d like to share few simple tips.
Light your candle for 3 to 4 hours the first time
When lighting your clean burning candle for the first time, let it burn for 3 to 4 hours. The idea here is that you'll want the top of the candle to fully melt from end to end (aka a “full melt pool”). If it doesn’t fully melt by the 4th hour, don’t worry and just turn it off. On that second burn, keep it lit again for 3 to 4 hours and you’ll certainly get that full melt pool. Why is this so important? Here are three reasons.
Reason #1: Avoid tunneling. Tunneling occurs when the wax in the center of the candle melts, but the surrounding wax around the wall of the jar remains unmelted. Over time, the wick burrows itself into a wax tunnel and then...the problem happens. As the wax heats up along the surrounding wall, the tunnel fills with melted wax and floods out the wick. It becomes impossible to keep your candle lit. But don’t worry so much about tunneling with our coconut wax candles. Coconut wax is easier to melt than most other types of wax blends and therefore it doesn't typically have tunneling issues.
Reason #2: Once you achieve the first full melt pool, it is faster and easier to get the top layer of wax fully melted with each following burn. Keep reading on to #3.
Reason #3: When you have a full melt pool, this is when you experience the strongest scent given off from your clean burning candle (aka a hot throw). Even better, with a full melt pool you'll get the most aromatherapeutic benefits from the essential oils dispersing in the air.
Keep your candle away from drafts
Keeping your lit candle away from an open window or outside the path of an air vent is a good idea. Such drafty areas create too much air flow and cause the flame to flicker due to an imbalance in the amount of wax being burned. You may or may not know, but your handcrafted candle's burn profile has been perfectly balanced with a particular wick for the specific jar size, wax blend, and fragrance oil level being used. It’s tricky business, yet this balance is very important for a candle to have a burn clean. Any imbalance, like when a flame becomes too large from excessive airflow, results in black smoke and soot build up on the inside of the jar.
So really, we should say before you light that candle, make sure it’s in a calm area away from drafts.
Snuff out your flame to extinguish it instead of blowing it out
Think twice about blowing out that candle out like it’s your birthday. Doing so results in excess smoke and soot which we are all trying to avoid. Even using the candle's lid to extinguish the flame isn’t recommended. While it’s better than blowing out the flames, the closed lid ends up trapping smoke and soot in the jar. This will leave black residue inside the jar and on the bottom of the lid. It will also make the wax look dirty and eventually affect your candle’s fragrance. Candle lids are better for adding aesthetic and keeping dust off the wax (dust can end up clogging a burning wick). They also help slow down the evaporation of the fragrance oils and extend the life of your scented candle.
Your best option for extinguishing a flame is to use a candle wick dipper or candle snuffer.
A wick dipper is a long tool with a hook at the end that catches onto your wick and dips it in the melted wax pool to put out the flame. This method produces the least amount of smoke. Just be sure to lift out the wick from the wax pool and straighten it for the next burn. One drawback to this method is you’ll likely get black debris from the wick left behind in the wax.
A candle snuffer is another long tool but instead of a hook at the end, it has a bell-shaped cone that sits over the flame and extinguishes it by cutting off oxygen. While this method produces a little more smoke than the wick dipper, it’s still much smoke less than blowing out your candle. Many prefer the snuffing method over wick dipping since it doesn’t leave debris behind in the wax pool.
Keep your wicks trimmed down to 1/4 inch
This final tip is certainly an important one. A wick that is too long or one that has a carbon mushroom on top may result in black smoke, soot build up, or even spark. Remember from earlier in the blog, your candle has been finely tuned using a specific wick to create a perfectly balanced flame and a flame that is too big will create an imbalance. To get the cleanest burn and the best experience with your candle, trimming your wicks is a must-do. As a rule of thumb, trim your wicks after every 4 hours of burn time.
Using a wick trimmer or scissors, trim each wick to about ¼ inch in length (roughly the height of 4 stacked quarters) while making sure to remove any carbon mushroom build up in the process. A little mushroom build up is normal with lead-free cotton wicks. All they need is a little trimming maintenance.
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Thanks for reading! We hope you picked up a thing or two that you’ll use for a cleaner-burning candle experience! And don’t forget to upcycle the candle jar when your done enjoying your Mightily Made candle.