# Vegan lip balms cracking



## jnl (Nov 26, 2018)

Hello!

Im having problems with my vegan lip balms cracking really badly.  I didnt have much problem before when i used a round tube.  But now im using the oval tube for a custom order and when removing the lid it makes the lip balm crack almost every time.  I have been using 24% wax for a long time and now it just wont work and I have to get this custom order finished TODAY!!!

I had to drop the wax down to 18% to get it to stop cracking, but it substatially changes the lip balm and is now not nearly as nice....too oily, not waxy enough, soaks in too fax because it doesnt have the wax barrier....

I cannot change the ingredient list because the labels were already professionally printed.

Anyone have any suggestions?

My ingredients are:
candelilla wax
cocoa butter
babassu oil
jojoba oil
rosehip oil
olive oil
avocado oil


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## BattleGnome (Nov 26, 2018)

What is your current recipe and how long are you waiting for your mix to cool before capping? Or more accurately can you post a pic of what you’re calling cracking? Many of us have different personal definitions and it will help unify the answers.

My hope is that maybe you can just wait a bit longer before pouring/capping because the different tubes hold heat differently. Without a pic I can’t know if I’m just assuming.


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## jnl (Nov 26, 2018)

BattleGnome said:


> What is your current recipe and how long are you waiting for your mix to cool before capping? Or more accurately can you post a pic of what you’re calling cracking? Many of us have different personal definitions and it will help unify the answers.
> 
> My hope is that maybe you can just wait a bit longer before pouring/capping because the different tubes hold heat differently. Without a pic I can’t know if I’m just assuming.



Even a couple days later they are still cracking almost every one when i turn the bottom, and thats without even putting a lid on.  It is catastrophic cracking, where its a hard break and a piece will fall out if you turned it upsidedown.  Not just a small hairline fracture.

Original recipe was 24% candelilla and 20% cocoa butter.  The rest liquid oils.

tho 2 different pours i did, one is terrible, and the other occasionally has one that is ok.......but its the same base (masterbatched the base) and was poured in the exact same way.


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## dixiedragon (Nov 26, 2018)

Did you put your melted master batch in a cold environment (fridge, freezer, outdoors if your weather is cold enough?)  I am thinking that if it cooled slowly, it may have separated, and maybe you got more stearic toward the bottom of the bucket.


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## jnl (Nov 26, 2018)

its not separated, its even throughout.  and i fully melt it before pouring some off.  it cools fairly quickly.


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## amd (Nov 26, 2018)

You might be using too much candelilla wax. Typically you would use about half as much as a traditional beeswax recipe. When I've made vegan, I've used 10-12% candelilla wax compared to my usual 20-27% beeswax. It is a much slicker / oily lip balm, but candelilla is such a firm wax there is no compromise when only using candelilla. I found a combination of stearic acid (18%) and candelilla (12%) to be better, but that doesn't help your label situation. The larger surface area of the lip balm in the oval container may make it more prone to cracking when you haven't seen it in the round tubes.


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## jnl (Nov 26, 2018)

k i just poured 3 of the original base...the one giving me lots of trouble......i over filled a tray, scraped it off, pulled the tube out when solid, cut the excess off, put them back in the tray and ran a heat gun to smooth the tops out.  waited only like half an hour and turned them up and down and they were all fine.  turned one ALL the way up then down and it cracked in half when i turned it back down and it hit the very end.  tho that crack goes about 1/4 of the way down the tube in the middle, and now it doesnt look so horrible.  putting caps on and off is NOT making it crack.  usually i dont like doing these tests so soon after pouring but i am out of time.  

this is driving me crazy.  why am i getting significantly different results with the exact same base, even when doing it in the exact same way.


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## BattleGnome (Nov 26, 2018)

I half wonder if it’s the coco butter. It’s been some time since I’ve used cocobutter but I remember it being very brittle. 

What if you lowered the coco butter to around 15%? Maybe you can up the wax again? (Note: I’ve never used candellia wax, not sure how different it is from bees wax)


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## jnl (Nov 26, 2018)

cocoa butter is brittle, but not nearly as brittle as candelilla wax.  its mostly the wax that is causing the trouble, but its the wax that makes it so nice.  if i can get the tube poured so it doesnt crack, and twist it up and down and it doesnt crack, then its an amazing lip balm.   less wax makes it not nearly as nice, but easier to pour.


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## jnl (Nov 27, 2018)

Oh, i figured out what was a large part of the problem......the tubes i got were not twisted all the way down.  so when i would raise the lip balm and lower it, the spine would push farther into the lip balm, and because its a brittle mix, it would crack.  So now i make sure every tube is twisted all the way down before pouring.  id say probably 2/3 of the tubes can be twisted a bit lower.  I am still getting some failures, but a lot less than before.


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## Zany_in_CO (Nov 27, 2018)

jnl said:


> Oh, i figured out what was a large part of the problem......






   Whew! Good on ya for figuring it out!


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## jnl (Nov 27, 2018)

thanks!

tho its still not great...getting between a 10% and 20% failure rate still.....and the molds are terrible and require a TON of clean up work.  it took WAY too long to make 300 lip balms.  and i still have 700 more to make....300 more by monday.


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## jnl (Nov 27, 2018)

The recipe is high in candelilla wax, and so its a very brittle balm.

BUT after you start using it, its no longer brittle..it becomes soft and creamy and looks/feels like a beeswax lip balm.  can anyone tell me why this is the case?  what is happening to it, and is there a way i can replicate that initially???  its very strange


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