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To trim candle wicks, carefully cut each wick with a pair of small scissors or a wick trimmer. For best results and for safety purposes, trim wicks when they’re at room temperature. If you forgot to trim the wick before burning your candle, for example, let it cool down before cutting it.
Should you trim your candle wick?
Why You Should Trim the Candle Wick Leaving a wick long means that you’ll have a larger flame, which will melt more wax and give the candle more fuel. Keeping the candle wick trimmed helps control the amount of melted wax (i.e., fuel) that the candle has access to, which helps limit the amount of soot it creates.
What should you trim your wick to?
It is recommended that you trim it to between ⅛ and ¼ of an inch and this should be done every 4 hours of burn time. After you blow out the flame, wait until the candle returns to room temperature before trimming the wick. You should then wait at least 2 hours before you light your candle again.
When should I trim my wick?
Keep the wick trimmed to 1/4 inch at all times. It is suggested to trim the wick every 4 hours of burn time. When wick trimming, you should always extinguish the flame, let the candle come to room temperature, and trim the wick before relighting.
What happens if you don’t trim the wick?
Trimming the wicks will keep the candle burning without any black soot and it will give your candle a longer burn time. Here is what happens when you do not trim the wicks properly. When a wick gets too long it cannot draw wax all the way up to the top of the wick. Therefore, the wick itself will start to burn.
What happens if I cut my candle’s wick too short?
Burning a candle without trimming the wick between uses could cause a dangerously large flame. It also increases the amount of soot that forms when the candle burns. That’s why you should always examine the wick length and trim it if necessary before lighting the candle.
What are wick trimmers?
A wick trimmer is an implement similar to scissors, used to trim down the wicks of candles.
What is candle tunneling?
Tunneling happens when only a small portion of the wax around the wick melts while the candle is burning. Instead of having the entire surface of the wax melt evenly, it will appear as though the flame is burrowing into the candle and creating what resembles a small, vertical tunnel — hence the name.
Should you trim a wood wick?
keep your wick trimmed. Trim the wooden wick before your first burn to 1/4 inch. Before your next burn, we suggest using candle wick trimmers to trim the wood wick to 1/4 inch again before re-lighting. If the wick is too long, it cannot absorb the wax and burn properly.
Why does my wooden wick keeps going out?
Other than the tunneling problem, if your wood wick candle won’t stay lit it’s probably because the wick is too long, or it needs to be trimmed clean of charred material. The flame is drawing the wax upwards through the wick, so if it’s not trimmed short and clean, the wax can’t make it to the flame.
How tall should wood wicks be?
Make sure your wick is trimmed to 3/16”-1/4” before lighting. If the wick is too long, the wax will not pull up the wick and the wick will extinguish. Like a traditional cotton wicks, wood wicks do require a little attention before each burn.
Why do you trim your wick?
Keeping the candle wick trimmed helps control your flame height. Too big of a flame will cause the candle to burn to hot which isn’t safe for you, your space or your candle. It will also cause and create black soot, not cute.
Why does the wick not burn?
The reason the wick does not burn is because the vaporizing wax cools the exposed wick and protects it. You may have seen the camping trick of boiling water in a paper cup. The cup does not burn because the water inside cools it. The liquid wax does the same thing for the wick.
Why do you trim the wick on an oil lamp?
In the days when light came from burning oil in lamps, a vessel at sea needed crewmen to constantly care for the lamps. This care involved trimming the wick, which drew the oil up from the storage reservoir, so that the flame would be clean and bright. A poorly trimmed wick creates a flame which is dim and smoky.
Can you trim a candle wick with scissors?
A simple pair of scissors can trim any wick, including candles that are in containers, like glass jars or votives. But after a couple of uses, the wick can be hard to reach. One trick is to access the wick with toenail clippers. You can also use a pair of wick trimmers made specifically for hard-to-reach wicks.
Do you light all 3 wicks?
If you decide to burn just one wick at a time, still do the first burn with all three wicks — then alternate between wicks for the single burns, so that you keep the level of wax more or less even across the surface of the candle.
How long should a candle burn first?
Solution: Particularly for their first burn, candles are supposed to burn for at least one hour per inch of container diameter. So, if you bought a new candle that is 3 inches in diameter, you should burn your candle for at least 3 hours (though not more than 4 at a time).
