While I certainly agree that the heat energy will leave the oven whether it goes through the door opening or through the walls of the oven, if you leave the door open you will probably make the Kitchen a bit more pleasant than if you let the heat escape through the walls. In the winter time, I would MUCH rather the heat of the oven go into the kitchen rather than the area around the refrigerator or into the insulated walls of my house. Seems like I might turn the heat off for a bit if the area I was in got too warm. That would save energy. Heloise (or her reader/writer) might be wrong in explaining why leaving the door open is a good idea, but she isn’t wrong that leaving the door open helps.
Back to the topic. I was planning on experimenting with the candle question but I got the flu and a sinus infection. Then I had to catch up at work. What a mess.
I am wondering that if this phenomenon is true, it’s not just the lip of melted wax but unaltered wax in a candle has different properties of wax that has been melted then cooled. The unaltered wax probably has a bit of air mixed in and I’m thinking that the wax pool might melt the altered wax a bit easier than the unaltered wax. So I’m thinking that it’s not just that the wax can’t spill over the brim, but it can’t melt the walls as easily as the bottom of the depression. What do you guys think about that?
I maintain that it does not help, in the case of a non-built-in oven.
Once turned off, the heat in the oven is going to get out one way or another. This will heat the house if the door is open or not.
Leaving the door open will make the kitchen feel warmer as the heat energy leaves the oven more quickly, warming the air in the kitchen.
However, if your kitchen shares a wall with the outside, the increased temperature increases the difference in temperatures between the inside and outside, increasing the heat transfer rate. If the oven were kept closed, the temp in the kitchen wouldn’t rise as much, keeping the delta-T between the kitchen and outside lower, thereby lowering heat transfer, and therefore reducing the need for furnace.
This won’t be a BIG savings (and maybe not even measureable), but it does show that in some cases it is better to leave the door closed.
If a built-in oven that is on an outside wall, it’s probably better to open the door due to that delta-T thing again, but this time between the oven and outside. If the kitchen is in the middle of the house and won’t warm any other rooms that do have outside walls, it won’t make a difference (energy wise).
See my own results in a message above. I found that as the newest melt-pool expands, it goes right past the old border with no problem. The only thing that seems to pin the hole’s growth at a constant diamter is a fairly large cliff (like 1cm tall.) Apparently the source of the “memory” effect is the wax cliff. It would be good if someone double checks this of course.
However, candles made from pressed powder seem to behave differently than candles cast as a single wax block. I didn’t experiment with the pressed-powder type. Maybe the “memory” effect in these is much larger?
Moriah’s “roll eyes” and dismissal of Heloise as “unscientific” was premature: there certainly is a memory effect in the cast candles, but only for melt-pool holes with diameter larger than approximately 2cm. Moriah’s reasoning about 1/4" holes was incorrect.
If evidence is lacking, then both belief AND DISBELIEF are irrational positions. Belief without evidence… that’s gullibility. Disbelief without evidence, that’s “pseudoskepticism.” If there’s no solid evidence available, we cannot say that something exists, and we cannot say that something DOESN’T exist. We can only say “we don’t know,” and then perhaps go and find out.
Here’s a great site that has an article about the extremely high ethics required of scientists:
Ah so!
Microwaves heat electrical conductors or semiconductors not insulators such as wax. Some chinaware heats more than others depending on the composition of the clay used to make it.
The tapers or tapered candles are made by dipping the wick in hot wax repeatably to build up the diameter. The last few dippings may be in a higher melting point way and the wick may or may not be a self trimming variety. Both variations affect the burn of the candle.
Cast blocks and pressed powder/granules are different beasts.
Heloise didn’t say ‘some’ candles with a meltpool of x diameter made from y material have a memory, she said candles have a memory. Therefore, you just proved she wasn’t correct in quoting the incorrect information from the candle trade association.
Since Heloise didn’t do the scientific experiment, therefore, by definition, she was unscientific.
Thus, the unspeakable horror which is the rolling of eyes still stands, especially as it applies to your blatant breaking of logical argument.
Although, I’ll give you props for actually doing the experiments yourself.