How Temperature and Humidity Can Ruin Your Makes

How Temperature and Humidity Can Ruin Your Makes

November 10, 2022
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At LiveMoor we deal with a lot of different wax products being used for a lot of different things. From candles to wax melts, beauty products and even sculptures. One thing we see in common at this time of year is people struggling with frosting, cracking, and general changes to the outcomes of their projects. Even experienced makers can be frustrated by problems with their wax with seemingly little explanation. Fortunately, there are things you can do to minimise issues and ensure your candles and melts are as smooth and shiny as ever. Understanding the impact that your environment can have is key and below we explain some of the simple science behind the thinking. LiveMoorAlthough you might not think it, the environment in which you choose to make your wax-based candles, melts, sculptures, or other wax products, is more than just a space in which to be creative. Your workspace is extremely important in the successful outcome of your chosen creation. Have you ever found your candles just won't adhere to their containers or your beautiful wax melts suddenly frost or crack even though you haven't changed your method? Take a look out the window - the reason for your troubles is probably easy to see. If it's a particularly hot day, then is your room too hot? If it's snowing, is your room too cold. If it's a wet day is your room too humid? Changes in the weather conditions can ruin your well- practiced method. Fortunately, if you plan accordingly by maintaining the right conditions, you can still make great products whatever the weather.Room temperature is an important factor to consider when making any wax-based products. If you suffer difficulties while making candles or melts, you should evaluate your room temperature. Forgetting to adjust room temperature before making your melts or candles is one of the most common causes of problems with wax. Trying to pour candles in a room that is too cold can cause separation. Separation occurs when hot wax refuses to mould to the cold glass jar. You can try to fix this by warming the edges of your candle jars or moulds with a hair dryer or heat gun, however, this does not always work.Ideally, you should make candles and melts in a room with an ambient temperature at between 21 and 26 degrees Celsius. Pour temperatures range between 50 and 70 degrees Celsius. Pouring candles in an environment that is too cold can cause them to crack or cool unevenly. Give your room time to warm up before beginning your making process. It needs to be at a steady and constant temperature. Check your room thermostat regularly as you go. After pouring let your makes cool in the same room for at least twelve hours. You don't want to shock them with a change of temperature.Humidity is simply an indication of the amount of moisture that is in the air. It is important to understand that humidity is relative - that is it varies with temperature. The warmer the air, the more moisture it can hold. Cold air on the other hand will quickly reach a point at which it cannot hold any more moisture - this is known as its dew point. Too much humidity can negatively impact the making process by causing air bubbles, lines, cracks, frosting, and more in your wax as it hardens. These are not only visually unappealing, but they can also compromise the scent throw of your product if you are adding fragrance.The easiest way to monitor humidity is with a small humidity sensor placed in your room. These normally read both room temperature and humidity as the two are related. Ideally, you want to keep the humidity in your room at around 50%. If the humidity is too high and it's a dry day, open some windows and let the dryer air from outside in to reduce the overall humidity level. If your room is particularly humid, perhaps it's a basement or an outbuilding with limited heating, you may need to use a dehumidifier to further reduce the moisture levels. Dehumidifiers help lower the humidity of the room you place them in bypassing the air through a system that draws the moisture from the air and either collects it in an internal reservoir or drains it into a nearby sink or bowl. Many modern dehumidifiers have a gauge on the side that shows the current humidity of the room and can be set to turn on and off automatically.If you do have problems with humidity, try not to introduce more moisture. Dry clothes outside and not on radiators. Make sure to open a window when having a shower or bath. Use lids on top of pans when cooking and use your extractor fan in the kitchen if you have one, otherwise, open a window. This will all help to keep the moisture levels down How does Humidity affect Scent Throw? If you burn a candle while it is humid, the scent throw is often weaker. There are several reasons that excess humidity causes your candle to appear to smell less strong. The main reason scent throw in humid air is weaker is the lack of available volume in the air. When a candle or wax melt burns in air with a low humidity the fragrance molecules coming off the candle can move through the air easily as the space between them is relatively large. In humid air, the gaps in the air are occupied by water molecules so the scent cannot move through the air as the water molecules are already taking up the space it needs. If water molecules already occupy the air volume, the scent throw of your candles or melts will be lower.When it comes to making products with wax, environmental factors are just as important as the ingredients. Your methodology should be measured each time to ensure repeatable results. If you are still struggling with results, you can try changing your ingredients - some wax products are more resistant to frosting - for example, our Live Moor Pillar wax has been formulated specifically to resist frosting. You can also try blending wax - adding some Paraffin to your wax can help too - it's a bit of trial and error but worth the effort! Whilst it's easy to blame poor outcomes on your chosen wax, it's far more likely to be a change in the environment. In an ideal scenario, we would all work under laboratory-controlled conditions - however, this isn't often possible - but we can still consider factors like room temperature and humidity when we start our projects and with minimal effort, we can maximise our chances of success. As ever, Happy Crafting!