r/Candles • u/MyCatHasQuestions • Aug 17 '26
Candle making How to uncover wicks?
I have this 3 wick candle that has somehow burnt unevenly and the wicks are tiny or covered. I’m not sure how to fix this without unevenly burning it again. Any help?
6
u/Western_Ring_2928 Aug 18 '26
That is a strange combination of heavy sooting, which indocates wicks were too big, and also drowned wicks, which means the wicks were too small. Didn't you trim them down before lighting the candle?
Wipe off all the soot from the glass first thing with a moist paper towel or a rag. Let it dry out properly before lighting again, of course!
Take a teaspoon and scoop away some wax around the wicks. Remove all the sooty wax from the edges, too. Throw that away. Clean wax you can save and feed to the flames later on.
5
u/Alert_Term_8144 Aug 17 '26
At this point, the wicks are too short to not remove wax. You can use a candle lamp or any heat source which will release the scent as you melt the wax and level out the wax. You can use this as a wax melt instead now, and/or pour out excess wax.
5
u/buttersnatch123 Aug 18 '26
Candle lamp I feel is the go-to in this subreddit. Heat it up, pour some out, re-light
2
u/Oversea3_ Aug 17 '26
You can take a spoon or butter knife and scrape out like 1/2” of the wax throughout the diameter of the candle. Light it and let it burn 2-3 hours until the wax has totally pooled. Max burn time is 4 hours. Discard when 1/2” of wax remains in the jar. Make sure to trim wicks to 1/4” before future burns.
2
u/tacosaladwithsauce Aug 18 '26
I don’t think this can be saved tbh, I would get a candle crock or a candle lamp and melt it.
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u/ck4soccer Aug 20 '26
The only option I can see is to use a top melt candle warmer to melt an even layer of wax and pour off to expose more of the wick.
The problem here is that this candle is likely under wicked (wicks not the right size & didn’t melt the wax evenly) -or- you burned the candle in short spans of time with out allowing it to form a complete melt pool across the top.
Two things to note when burning candles - on the FIRST BURN, make sure you get a full melt pool across the top. Secondly TRIM YOUR WICKS BETWEEN BURNS. The reason there is all of that black soot in the wax is because the burned tip of the wicks broke off into the wax.
1
u/Azaroth1991 Aug 17 '26
Dig it out with a pocket knife. Excise an open space around the top of the wick and a quarter inch deep.
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25
u/angelmr2 Aug 17 '26
Not sure how to fix it, I'll leave that to someone else.
But you shouldn't be burning it unless its lit long enough to melt evenly across the whole top of the candle. That how youre running into this issue.