Eli5 How does a flame light a candle if it is touched to the smoke trail of a just blown out candle.
In: Chemistry
The smoke might contain some of the vaporised wax still coming off the candle.
FYI the wax itself it what actually burns in a candle, its fuel, the wick does burn to an extent, but it’s merely a mechanism to pull up wax to a usable point to burn. It’s also an imperfect one, candles are essentially imperfect oil lamps. Oil lamps work almost exactly the same only the fuel starts out as a liquid and needs to be bottled, but the wicking is the same in principle.
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