Will heating up carnauba wax to reform it break it down?

2wheelsx2

2wheelsx2

New member
I recently decided to "revive" my old tin of Mother's carnauba wax to use on friends' and family car (the good stuff #20, #20 is for me!). It had been sitting on the shelf for a while and had dried a bit and was broken up into lumps. I turned on the oven to 200 degrees and put the tin in, intending to leave it for 5 minutes. However, I was in my garage detailing my car and forgot and left it for 20 minutes. When I took the tin out, it was liquid!!:scared



Will this have broken down the wax and polymers in the wax so that it is pretty uselss now? I have used it and it seems fine, but I wonder if it has compromised the wax's properties.
 
Actually, I did try it on a friend's car. He had a light scratch, so I got out my SMR and removed it for him, and then applied a bit of the wax over it. And like I said, it seemed to spread and buff off same as usual, but I just don't if its properties have been compromised.
 
There are 2 problems with trying to reblend wax. Generally, wax broken up in small pieces is a sign of it being frozen, and the moisture in the wax expanding, breaking it apart.



Problem #1 - the wax has some solvents as carriers. 200ºF may be above the flash point of some of them, which could cause a cloud of fumes in the oven - creating an explosive atmosphere.



Problem #2 - the components were blended under a certain temperature, and in a certain order. Heating the product to 200ºF merely melts it all together, destroying the structure of the wax.



A can of paste wax is ~$9 or so. I'd suggest spending another $9 rather than risk an explosion in the house.
 
Thanks for the info, Forrest. Unfortunately, I tried this already! :scared



I guess I'm lucky nothing happened. Won't be trying that again!
 
Don't know about wax, but I do know that melted and rehardened chocolate (some chocolate) technically does not carry the same structure as the originally made product.
 
I can guarantee that it was a warm liquid when they put it in the can :), but 200* might be a titch warm. Next time use a water bath on an electric (not gas- ignition hazard) stove.



Good idea though!



Robert
 
Gee, I wished I would have thought of that. Oh well, no big deal. That tin of wax is over 5 years old anyway. :)
 
Flash point refers to the minimum temperature at which a flammable or combustible liquid can be ignited. for example, the flash point for gasoline is -44 degrees Farenheit. Any liquid with a flash point of 100 degrees Farenheit and under is considered a flammable liquid. If the flash point is 101 degrees and over is considered to be combustible.



The flammability/combustibility of any car cleaning product is usually listed on the container or can be obtained from the Matertal Safety Data Sheet (MSDS).



I agree with Forrest...it's better to buy a fresh can of wax as opposed to burning down the house to save a buck!
 
Ghaaa next time just open the can and light it on fire! I use to do it with Kiwi Shoe polish and it melts and reform a nice brick. Will shorten the life of the shoe polish though. I'm sure it does the same thing with wax.



Like porterdog said it was a liquid when it was put in a can but 200 is pretty high... I'm sure lighting it on fire would be hotter though.



Paste was is mainly Carnauba wax and carnauba can melt and then cool and reforma. I'm sure it would be fine. You'll probably lose some of the solvents in the process though.
 
Intel486 said:
Ghaaa next time just open the can and light it on fire! I use to do it with Kiwi Shoe polish and it melts and reform a nice brick. Will shorten the life of the shoe polish though. I'm sure it does the same thing with wax.
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So THAT'S why people do that! I've seen it done several times but never knew what the heck for. Learn something new everyday! :xyxthumbs
 
I always thought people melted the wax with fire to get more on the cloth and on the shoe than in solid form. Sorta makes sense.
 
I would be careful of heating in a water bath. If you go off and forget it, all the water might boil away. Then you're heating it almost directly on the burner.:nono
 
I melted the Kiwi black shoe polish into a liquid (talk about getting high, better open some windows next time) and then applied it onto my black leather oxfords. I then tried to spit shine them didn't work to well. I then turned the shoes in (old and broken anyhow.)



So this might be a little off topic, but I found a enw way to prepare the shoe for a spit shine.



Take a green scotch brite pad (cut into 1 inch squares) and soak it in rubbing alcohol. Then scrub down the shoes till all the old polish/wax is off and the leather is raw (nothing on it.) this make take a few scratch brite pads to do, it did for the shoes I'm working on.



Then apply a black shoe leather dye and let it sit over night to dry. Spread a medium-thick layer of Kiwi orginal paste polish onto the enitre shoe and let sit overnight.



Come back in the morning and start spit-shining the shoe.



I got the left one almost done (needs some more layers) and the right one I just started spit-shining (did the two day prep already.) I find that if you spit-shine the shoe for a few hours (my case two) let the shoes sit for 24 hours, then come back and start spit-shining some more, the gloss and depth increases. The left shoe took me two hours of spit-shining on each of the two days to get to that point. My dead line to get these shoes ready is June 25, so I have some time (I use Adcor black leather dye and Kiwi Original paste polish, with some coats of Parade Gloss mixed in, for the edges and soles, I use Kiwi Honor Guard edge and sole dressing.)



8-yo0oXvyxE9A3riTC-ZmZaDhLBiu8Gn0180.jpg


(the shoes are 6 years old and has been neglected in the past, this is for a friend of mine, hence the leather having some marks I just can't get out.)



Anyhow back to topic. I would just get a new tin of wax, also allows me to add some other goodies to get my detailing fix.

Jason
 
Shoes look great Jason! Do you have an Alpha inspection coming up? When I was in the Corp. I used to break my shoes down similar to you and found that if I applied 2-3 coats of dye buffing between coats provided a great base for polish and spit shining. :xyxthumbs
 
Not Alphas (not yet anyway), its for a color guard on the 26th (high school graduation.)



I'll have to try that layering of the dye soon! heck I'll do it to the right shoe since I just started on it.



Yep Intel, shine those shoes up nicely :)
 
"I agree with Forrest...it's better to buy a fresh can of wax as opposed to burning down the house to save a buck!"





True. Don't let this happen to you... (not that I'd ever use that on my truck anyway) ;)



jwax-fire.jpg
 
Taxlady said:
I would be careful of heating in a water bath. If you go off and forget it, all the water might boil away. Then you're heating it almost directly on the burner.:nono
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Any time I turn on anything that has to do with heating or cooking (even the forman grill), I set the oven time. 15 minutes or anything longer than cooking itself. My oven has that annoying buzzer that just constantly goes until you turn it off. I'd hate to burn the house down on accident.
 
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