Create Your Own Candle Making Wicks

Whether for its function, decoration, therapy or simply just to brighten up your day, candles are used by everyone whatever that reason may be. But its size, shape, color and fragrance will always be a secondary factor in choosing a candle; the most important factor will always be the light it radiates – and that is in the strands at the center of it, which is called the wick.

Let’s talk about how to make your own candle making wicks. Candle Making Wicks are usually composed of cotton strands, twisted together and soaked into a salt/boric acid dilution. This makes the wick produce just the right amount of brightness, emit less soot, once wax is poured into it and later on lit up. Once your wick cords are made, the next thing to consider is where you would put these varieties in a wax.

As a general rule, your candle making wicks, should be made so that they’re just enough to melt the wax with the right amount of light, without consuming the candle quickly or sputter out halfway. The size and the way you make candle wicks, will determine which kind of candle it would suitably serve.

Wicks are differently made to accommodate the kind of candle it will serve. The most common candle making wicks, would be twisted wicks, made up of three cotton strands twisted together. These are used in tapers or slim candles – they combust just right even with the least amount of wax used. However, some of these twisted wicks doesn’t last very long once it is introduced to a larger sized candle, such as a pillar candle. The amount of heat that it generates may not be suitable enough to melt the wax completely, causing it to drown. Also, the fire may already consume that piece of string even before it is able to melt the candle’s surface. So instead of twisted wicks, braided or knitted wicks are used for pillars. Braided wicks are cords of twisted strands bound together to make the light and heat intense enough to melt a bigger surface of wax.

For candles in glass containers or votives, the melted wax would not simply flow down the candle – it gradually evaporates as the flame constantly heats up the liquefied wax. Twisted or braided wicks won’t do the trick, as they would bend over and drown out the moment its base forms into hot liquid. That is why stiffer cores are introduced in the wicks to keep it stand upright. Made up of tin and zinc, their round cross-sections make it stand up as the liquid wax dissolves away.

The right kind of candle making wicks makes the best kinds of candles. Once these variations are chosen for a particular candle project, then it would be much easier to select the right kind of size, shape, color and fragrance, as you will be assured that the light it will shine will always be the same up to its very end.

I hope this article enlightened you on candle making wicks. For more information and general tips on candle making. Feel free to sign up for your very own free candle making course below.