Candle tunnelling happens when a candle burns down its centre, leaving hard wax around the outside edges of your vessel. This wax builds up and means your candle won’t achieve it’s maximum burn-time and the wick will become more and more difficult to light and eventually be drowned by melting wax.

Why this happens:

• Wick is not properly trimmed
• candle was not burning long enough so wax melts to edges.

How to fix it:

You can fix this by using tinfoil to create a tent over your candle so that the heat reaches the edge and will burn the extra wax down.

Wood wicks can take a bit of getting used to. They are harder to burn than a cotton wick but once you figure it out you may never go back to a cotton wick. Wood wicks ge their fuel from the wax, this means the wick needs to be trimmed shorter than a cotton wick. It usually only needs to be 5mm. If your wick is not burning properly blow it out and let it cool, use your wick trimmers or fingers to trim the wick. Re light your candle and you should see the flame.

The primary cause of black smoke is an overly long wick.When a candle burns, the wax near the flame melts and the liquid wax is pulled up the wick to feed the flame. If the wick is too long, the balance of heat and fuel will be off. This throws off the chemical reaction and can produce excess soot and smoke.

FIX:

Blow out your candle and let it cool down. Once cool trim your wick to about 1/8" and relight it.