- Joined
- Jul 31, 2007
- Messages
- 1,421
Well, after all the jute and wax pictures I've seen, I thought I'd give some wax a try. I got a HUGE piece sent to me by a generous forum member, and it's great stuff!
Here are my experiments:
I cut off some chunks and melted them in a tin can inside of another pot. I started by just dropping the cotton balls in, waiting for them to get saturated, then pulling them out and letting them dry. WAY TO MUCH WAX! I couldn't get these bricks of wax to do anything. I smashed them with rocks, used my knife to fluff them up, tore them in half, and I just couldn't get them to do anything, especially not catch a spark by a ferro rod.
Next I tried cotton balls in wax the same way, but put them on a slanted cook sheet covered in aluminum foil, and I used some plastic sticks to roll or knead out extra hot, runny wax. This worked MUCH better, but the end result still wasn't very usable.
Then I tried just dipping the cotton balls in wax, get half saturated, and then rolling hot wax out of them. This worked very well, and I just got really aggressive about getting the wax back out. The tops of them were semi-fluffy, and the bottoms cover in a fair amount of wax. While they were still warm, I'd peel them off the foil, and roll them, so that the fluff was all on the inside. They ended up looking like big pills. I let them cool, and then unrolled one, fluffed it up, and it took a spark! These worked pretty good, but would blow out fairly easily in the first 30 seconds of burning. After they got burning well though, they were hard to blow out. Burn time around 10 minutes. I think a little less wax and they would be perfect.
I also tried melting some PJ and dipping cotton balls in them. I saturated them, and used a similar rolling method to get out excess PJ. These burned great, but I getting them to fluff up was quite a challenge. These burned for 10-15 minutes once lit though, and were very hard to blow out.
I also made some traditional PJCB's, and these are still my favorite. I loaded up an extra film canister for my pack, but I still prefer to have PJCB firestraws. I tried packing the film canister in a new PSK case I got, but it's just an awkward size. I'm going to make some larger firestraws, because they pack so well. Messing with the melted wax wasn't a lot of fun either. PJ isn't as bad, but still pretty annoying to work with.
I was going to try some jutebombs, but I couldn't find my jute.
I took a ton of pictures, and some videos of WCB vs. PJCB, as well as the rolling technique I was talking about, but I won't be able to post those for couple of days.
Anywho, I had fun messing around and experimenting, now I just to get the traces of wax out of the kitchen before my wife comes home!
I'd like to try making some candles next.
L!
Here are my experiments:
I cut off some chunks and melted them in a tin can inside of another pot. I started by just dropping the cotton balls in, waiting for them to get saturated, then pulling them out and letting them dry. WAY TO MUCH WAX! I couldn't get these bricks of wax to do anything. I smashed them with rocks, used my knife to fluff them up, tore them in half, and I just couldn't get them to do anything, especially not catch a spark by a ferro rod.
Next I tried cotton balls in wax the same way, but put them on a slanted cook sheet covered in aluminum foil, and I used some plastic sticks to roll or knead out extra hot, runny wax. This worked MUCH better, but the end result still wasn't very usable.
Then I tried just dipping the cotton balls in wax, get half saturated, and then rolling hot wax out of them. This worked very well, and I just got really aggressive about getting the wax back out. The tops of them were semi-fluffy, and the bottoms cover in a fair amount of wax. While they were still warm, I'd peel them off the foil, and roll them, so that the fluff was all on the inside. They ended up looking like big pills. I let them cool, and then unrolled one, fluffed it up, and it took a spark! These worked pretty good, but would blow out fairly easily in the first 30 seconds of burning. After they got burning well though, they were hard to blow out. Burn time around 10 minutes. I think a little less wax and they would be perfect.
I also tried melting some PJ and dipping cotton balls in them. I saturated them, and used a similar rolling method to get out excess PJ. These burned great, but I getting them to fluff up was quite a challenge. These burned for 10-15 minutes once lit though, and were very hard to blow out.
I also made some traditional PJCB's, and these are still my favorite. I loaded up an extra film canister for my pack, but I still prefer to have PJCB firestraws. I tried packing the film canister in a new PSK case I got, but it's just an awkward size. I'm going to make some larger firestraws, because they pack so well. Messing with the melted wax wasn't a lot of fun either. PJ isn't as bad, but still pretty annoying to work with.
I was going to try some jutebombs, but I couldn't find my jute.
I took a ton of pictures, and some videos of WCB vs. PJCB, as well as the rolling technique I was talking about, but I won't be able to post those for couple of days.
Anywho, I had fun messing around and experimenting, now I just to get the traces of wax out of the kitchen before my wife comes home!
I'd like to try making some candles next.
L!
