My New Wick Batch Passes the First Burn but Behaves Differently Near the Bottom of the Candle — Should Incoming Qualification Include a Complete Burn Test?
शेयर करना
Does every wick lot need a full burn? No. Use risk triggers: a visible change, late-burn differences, a new supplier, a tab change or a complaint. Stable routine lots can be released on a short comparison.
What is the control in a full-burn test? A candle made from the same melt with a retained wick from your approved lot, burned in the same sessions beside the new-lot candle.
What result means reject? A flame that grows late, glass that runs noticeably hotter than the control, heavy smoke or soot near the base. Treat those as safety results.
Why a wick can pass the first burn and fail at the bottom
A first burn on a fresh candle happens in the easiest conditions the wick will ever meet. The jar is cool, the wax column is tall, the fragrance is at full strength, and the melt pool has room to spread before heat builds up. By the last few centimetres, almost everything has changed. The glass has been heated and cooled many times. The pool sits close to the base, where heat reflects back from the glass and the tab. The wick has carbonised and been trimmed repeatedly. Oil that migrated downward during cure can make the remaining wax richer in fragrance than the top was.
A wick lot that differs only slightly from your approved one can hide that difference for hours. A marginally thicker braid or a heavier treatment may give a normal flame at the top, then grow a noticeably larger flame as the glass warms. A marginally thinner one may look fine early, then drown as the pool deepens near the tab. The tab and its neck matter too. If the neck is shorter or the crimp sits differently, the flame may die early, leaving wax in the jar, or burn closer to the base than it should.
So the direct answer is yes: when a new wick lot shows any difference from your approved lot, incoming qualification should include at least one complete burn to the end, beside a retained control. The first-burn result tells you the top is acceptable. Only a full burn tells you the whole candle is.
When a full burn belongs in goods-in, and when it does not
A full burn test takes days of attended sessions, so it should be triggered by risk, not run on every delivery by habit. Routine lots from a stable source can often be released on a visual check and a short comparison burn. The triggers below are a suggested starting point to adapt to your own records.
| Situation at goods-in | Suggested test | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| New lot, looks and burns the same as control on first burn | Short comparison burn only | No evidence of change; full burn adds cost without new information |
| First burn fine, but behaviour differs later in the burn | Full burn to end, new lot beside retained control | The difference is time-dependent and may grow near the base |
| Wick looks thicker, thinner, stiffer or differently coated | Full burn to end on at least one candle | Construction change can shift late-burn heat |
| Tab or neck looks different from approved lot | Full burn to end | End-of-life behaviour depends on the tab |
| New supplier or a replacement for a discontinued wick | Full burn on every jar size you make | No history to lean on |
| Customer complaint about the end of a candle | Full burn on retained wicks from that lot | Investigation, not just acceptance |
A practical full-burn protocol for a new wick lot
The aim is a fair comparison. Everything except the wick lot is held constant, and both candles are burned to the end in the same sessions. This is a suggested starting point; write down any changes you make so the next test is comparable.
Worked example: what a full-burn qualification costs
Suppose your product is a 200 g candle in the CSI 200 ml matte glass jar, using Luxury Soy Wax CSI 464 and Lavender at 8% of total candle weight. The fragrance load convention gives 200 × 0.08 = 16 g of oil and 184 g of wax per candle. The jar page states a "fill weight of 200 ml", which is a volume rather than a weight, so weigh your real fill once and adjust these figures to it.
| Component | Source price | Working | Cost per candle |
|---|---|---|---|
| CSI 464 wax, 184 g | 1 kg ₹507.40 | 0.184 × ₹507.40 | ₹93.36 |
| Lavender oil, 16 g | 1 kg ₹5,221.00 | 0.016 × ₹5,221.00 | ₹83.54 |
| 200 ml matte jar | pack of 10 ₹708.00 | ₹708.00 ÷ 10 | ₹70.80 |
| Eco Candle Wick, Thin (C1) | 1,000 for ₹5,900.00 | ₹5,900.00 ÷ 1,000 | ₹5.90 |
| Total | ₹93.36 + ₹83.54 + ₹70.80 + ₹5.90 | ₹253.60 |
A matched pair costs 2 × ₹253.60 = ₹507.20 in materials. If you add a second new-lot candle to confirm the result is not a one-off, three candles cost 3 × ₹253.60 = ₹760.80. The real cost is attended time: several sessions across several days. Work out your own burn hours from the approved control, because CSI does not publish burn rates for its wicks and none should be assumed.
Now set that against the lot. If the new wick lot is 1,000 wicks feeding 1,000 of these candles, the material inside those candles is 1,000 × ₹253.60 = ₹2,53,600.00. A full-burn qualification at ₹760.80 is about 0.3% of that. And a late-burn fault is the kind that appears weeks after sale, when the customer reaches the bottom of the jar, long after the whole lot has shipped.
Making the call once the candles reach the base
Compare the two records side by side rather than judging the new-lot candle on its own. You are looking for whether the new wick behaves like the approved one throughout, not whether it is acceptable in the abstract. A wick that burns a little differently but safely and cleanly to the end may still be usable; one that runs hotter near the base is not, however good the top looked.
| Late-burn result compared with control | Decision | Next step |
|---|---|---|
| Same flame, pool, glass warmth and ending | Accept and release the lot | File both burn records with the lot |
| Slightly larger flame late on, glass no warmer | Conditional release; recheck on next production candle | Watch the first production pull to the end |
| Flame grows, glass noticeably hotter, or soot late | Reject for this jar and formula | Keep the lot in quarantine; contact supplier |
| Drowns or goes out early, wax left behind | Quarantine; test in a smaller jar only if you make one | Do not rewick your formula around a variable lot |
If the new lot fails, resist the urge to change your wax, load or jar to make it work. Your formula was approved; the wick lot is the variable. Send photos of both candles at the end, with your session notes, to the supplier and ask what changed. For CSI wicks, the WhatsApp number is +91 7397976926; record the answer against the lot. A wick lot that fails at the bottom goes back in quarantine whoever supplied it, including us.
Where this page fits
CSI already has guides that cover parts of this question. This page covers the goods-in check for the question above; these go deeper on the rest:
Three things to buy for this job
| Option | Price | Status on the September 2026 pull |
|---|---|---|
| Pack of 5 | ₹354.00 | In stock |
| Pack of 10 | ₹708.00 | In stock |
| Option | Price | Status on the September 2026 pull |
|---|---|---|
| 500 g | ₹260.00 | In stock |
| 1 kg | ₹507.40 | In stock |
| 5 kg | ₹2,537.00 | In stock |
| 10 kg | ₹5,074.00 | In stock |
| Option | Price | Status on the September 2026 pull |
|---|---|---|
| 15 g | ₹105.02 | In stock |
| 50 g | ₹270.00 | In stock |
| 100 g | ₹540.00 | In stock |
| 500 g | ₹2,620.00 | In stock |
| 1 kg | ₹5,221.00 | In stock |
CANDLEMAKINGSUPPLIESINDIA supplies raw materials and production equipment, not finished candles. This guide separates general quality-control practice from what CSI's own product pages state, says plainly what CSI does not publish (lot numbers, certificates of analysis, tolerances), and labels every sample size, tolerance or retained quantity as a starting point for your own validation.
Prices are live CSI prices from September 2026; product pages are authoritative. Where a spec is not published — such as a lot number, a jar's internal diameter or a wick's burn rate — this guide says so rather than filling the gap.
For bulk quotes, questions about a specific delivery, GST invoicing, IFRA and MSDS documents, message us on WhatsApp at +91 7397976926.
Frequently asked questions
- I Have Already Approved This Wick Size — Do I Really Need to Repeat Testing Every Time I Receive a New Production Lot?
- My Supplier Says the New Wick Is Equivalent to My Discontinued Wick — What Tests Should I Complete Before Treating It as a Direct Replacement?
- I’m Switching Wick Suppliers to Reduce Cost by ₹1 per Candle — How Do I Determine Whether the Savings Justify the Cost of Complete Revalidation?
- My New Wick Costs Less but Has More Variation Between Pieces — How Should Reject Rate Factor Into the True Commercial Cost?
- I’m Buying Thousands of Pre-Tabbed Wicks for My Candle Business — What Physical and Burn-Performance Checks Should Be Part of Incoming QC?
- How Do I Create a Wick QC Specification Covering Dimensions, Tab Attachment, Straightness, Consistency, Flame Behaviour, Mushrooming, Melt Pool and Full-Life Burn Performance?
- I Bought 1,000 Pre-Tabbed Wicks and Some Tabs Are Visibly Off-Centre — Should I Use Them or Reject the Affected Pieces?
- My New Wick Shipment Looks Slightly Thicker Than the Previous Batch Even Though I Ordered the Same Size — Should I Repeat Burn Testing?
- Why Every New Wax × Wick × Fragrance Combination Needs Burn Testing
- Why Does My Candle Tunnel Even With The Correct Wick?
Customer reviews: The reviews at the top are genuine, published Judge.me reviews — Shanu Shah (5★, verified); Ashwini (5★, not recorded as verified); Monika Deep (4★, verified); Tina Lynette Lazaro Moganti (5★, verified); Lalitha Jagan (5★, not recorded as verified); Arshad Shaikh (5★, verified). Names, ratings, dates and products as recorded by Judge.me.
Product facts (September 2026, CSI live store): Matte / Frosted Glass Jar (200 ml): Pack of 5 ₹354.00, Pack of 10 ₹708.00 — page states "fill weight of 200 ml" and "Height 8 cm width 7 cm" (outer size); several colours, some out of stock. Luxury Soy Wax CSI 464 (flakes): 500 g ₹260.00, 1 kg ₹507.40, 5 kg ₹2,537.00, 10 kg ₹5,074.00 — 100% soy container wax in flakes · single pour · stated fragrance load up to 10% · stated shelf life 60 months (cool, dry storage). Lavender Fragrance Oil: 15 g ₹105.02, 50 g ₹270.00, 100 g ₹540.00, 500 g ₹2,620.00, 1 kg ₹5,221.00 — single-note lavender; top fresh lavender, middle herbal green, base soft musk · stated candle load 6–10% · rated "Strong" on the product page · flashpoint and vanillin not published on the page.
Assumptions: Fragrance load is a percentage of total candle weight (200 g = 184 g wax + 16 g oil at 8%). CSI product pages do not publish lot numbers, certificates of analysis, tolerances, jar internal diameters, wick dimensions or mould hardness; where this guide needs them, it tells you to measure or ask. Sample sizes, tolerances, retained quantities, test lengths and acceptance rules are suggested starting points to validate, not standards or CSI policy. Hypothetical supplier prices are CSI prices adjusted by the stated percentage and labelled as such. Worked examples are illustrations. Prices and availability change — product pages are authoritative.