We get asked a lot of questions about how to clean beeswax. We have tried several methods, but this is the current process that we use at kiwimana.

The whole point of cleaning the wax is to remove as much Debris as possible, you often get bits of bees or clumps of propolis in your bees wax. So the first step is to filter out the bulk of these objects.

Cheesecloth bag full of beeswax ready to go We do this by boiling the raw beeswax from our Solar Wax Extractor, I discovered this new method via this episode of the BK Corner Podcast Sticky Notes. You gather all your old wax and a large stone (yes a stone) and bundle it up together in a cheese cloth.

Cheesecloth Bag in Pot

Wax Starting to move to top of pot You then add this to a large boiling pot (get one from your local charity shop), don’t borrow one from the kitchen. Bring the bag to a boil, the wax and only the wax will rise to the top of the pot. Leaving behind the stone and debris from the wax. Let this sit and cool for around six hours (Best to leave overnight), or until the side of the container is cool to touch. Remove the block of wax and scrap any crap from the bottom. You will get a layer of brown sludgey stuff, a mix of propolis and small dirt particles. Second Stage Boiling Now the next stage involves reboiling the wax and repeating the above scraping process. You only need to do the cheese cloth part once. Once you happy that no more dirt will be removed doing this process, use a double boiling to do the final wax pour into a mold of candles.

A double boiling is a container that you sit within a pan of boiling water, we use an old steel milk jug. You could use any small metal container, just make sure you have someway of removing it from the boiling water without burning your hands and dropping the clean wax. The last stage is to add your clean wax to a mould of your choice. Have fun but remember never leave your boiling wax unattended. Remember the old saying “Mind Your Own Beeswax”. Beeswax can ignite if its near a naked flame.

So what do you think? Do you have any other tips you can add here, how do you clean your Beeswax? Please comment below…

Our Wax Processing Setup