Stainless wick frame with tripod and vat, up to 30 candles

01 · DIPPED CANDLES, IN SERIES

Thirty candles growing at once

A dipped candle is made by dipping the wick in molten wax over and over: each pass leaves about a millimetre, so a 20 mm candle is twenty or thirty dips. Done with loose wicks that is a whole afternoon and drips everywhere.

With this set you work in batches: the wicks are mounted on the frames, the frames hang from the tripod and go in whole. Five frames, up to 30 candles growing at the same rate — and by the time you finish the fifth, the first is cool and ready for the next pass.

The 50 × 50 cm tray catches what drips and returns it to the bath. At the price of beeswax, that is not a detail.

02 · THE WAX AT 70 TO 75 °C

No hotter and no cooler

Beeswax melts between 62 and 65 °C, but for dipping the bath is held between 70 and 75 °C. Hotter, and each pass melts off the one before, so the candle never thickens. Cooler, and the wax grips in lumps and leaves a rough surface.

Above 85 °C the wax darkens and loses its scent, which is precisely what you pay for in a wax candle. Hence a set built to work inside a melter with a stable temperature, not in a saucepan.

03 · THE WICK IS CHOSEN FIRST

The candle's diameter fixes the wick's

The wick has to be matched to the candle's finished diameter, and that is decided before the first dip: a wick too light for its candle drowns the flame in molten wax, and one too heavy runs down the side.

For dipping you use flat braided wick on the roll, cut to length and folded over the frame. Pre-cut wicks with a metal sustainer are for moulded or container candles: they are no use here.

04 · IT GOES INSIDE THE 30 KG MELTER

The depth of the bath limits the candle

The set is built to the measure of the 30 kg wax melter, which is what gives it the bath depth and the stable temperature the process needs. A dipped candle cannot be longer than the wax it is dipped into.

It is all stainless steel, and cold wax releases from stainless on its own: cleaning is scrape and re-melt, not dissolve.

05 · BEFORE YOU BUY

It needs the 30 kg melter and flat braided wick on the roll. Neither is included.