Skye Candles Product Care Series
THE FIRST BURN · WICK CARE · BURN TIMES
The Art of the Slow Burn
How to enjoy every candle, from the first light to the very last.
Why Is My Candle Tunnelling?
How to Fix It (and Stop It Happening)
You light your new candle, enjoy it for an hour, blow it out... and a few burns later there's a narrow hole down the middle with a thick wall of untouched wax round the sides. That's called tunnelling, and it's one of the questions our team gets asked most.
The good news: it's almost always fixable, and very easy to prevent. Here's what our candle makers in the workshop recommend.
Light for 3-4 hrs for your candle's first burn
Trim the wick to 1 cm before every burn
When 1 cm of wax remains: time to stop
What is candle tunnelling?
Tunnelling is when a candle burns straight down the centre instead of melting evenly across the whole surface. The wax round the edge never melts, loosing hours of burn time and the fragrance. The deeper the tunnel gets, the harder it is for the flame to reach the edges, so it tends to get worse with every burn.
The first burn was too short
This is the big one. Soya wax has a "memory". The size of the melt pool on the first burn sets the pattern for every burn after it. If you blow it out after 30 minutes, the candle will keep trying to melt only that small circle.
The wick
A cheap or undersized wick can't throw enough heat to reach the edges. It's why we use thick linen wicks in all our candles. They're designed to burn out to the side within a couple of hours when used properly.
Lots of short burns
Even after a good first burn, regularly lighting a candle for just a few minutes lets the tunnel creep back.
Draughts can also play a part
A breeze from a window or doorway pushes the flame to one side, so one edge melts while the other doesn't.
Minor Tunnelling
Even Burn
The perfect first burn
Looking down on your candle from above, here's what you're aiming for.
Keep your candle lit until the melt pool touches the glass all the way round - this usually takes 3 to 4 hours.
If you only have a small pool around the wick, don't blow your candle out yet!
1 HOUR BURN
A small pool around the wick will have formed. Don't blow it out yet!
2 HOUR BURN
The pool is spreading. Nearly there.
3-4 HOUR BURN
Edge to edge. Now you can blow it out.