A wax mill is a pepper grinder type device that produces candle wax instead of pepper,this device is usable by the candle makers of the convent to save time & materials in making candles for the convent building!
Tell me what you fine people think of this device & how it might be made better.
I personally don't like it.
A pepper mill, you put in pepper and it grinds it down to sprinkle as seasoning. similiar to if you crushed it bowl with mortar and pestle. It is a processing tool, not a creation tool.
Creating wax would require vis to create something permanantly. When making candles there are a lot better ways than collecting ground up and shredded wax.
OTOH, why bother creating it permanently when you're just going to burn it anyway?
Exactly - there is genius in your method, Abe!
I played with something similar. Of course, it ~would~ be annoying on those full and new moons when a whole wave of candles just disappeared, but for 13 days out of 14, pure gravy! 
Whoa whoa whoa. I feel like an idiot asking, but are we talking about an enchanted item that makes wax sprinkles, or just a freaking ordinary device that grinds up wax?
If this is magical... why? Why would any self-respecting mage spend the time and vis to do this? Aren't there enough candles in the world? How about making a magical lantern, it's less messy, or do you have trouble with ignem?
It's a good example of there being more than one way to skin a cat. If you want to light your covenant, you can enchant a pile of magic lanterns (or, alternatively, a magic stick that makes the crystals in each room glow), or you can use CrAn to make temporary candles, or CrAq to make lamp oil, or I suppose CrHe to make (bad) torches. It simply depends on the arts and the vis you have available.
Because candles, altho' they are individually cheap, are used massively, and can drain huge amounts of money if a covenant wants to be well lit in every nook and cranny, or even a single large hall and all labs.
To be realistic, a "well lit" room doesn't have a single candelabra or three - it has many. Think how bright "one hundred candle power" is. And beeswax/tallow candles tend to burn fairly quickly.
(There is no direct formula between "candlepower" (now called "candelas") and watts,but a good flashlight might be measured in 1000's of candlepower - all concentrated in that tiny circle it lights. Divide that up by the number of those circles in a sphere, and you get something in the (very rough) neighborhood of 50:1, or 50 candles/1 watt. And we've all been in a room with a 40 watt light bulb.)
Now, admittedly, the magic item is expensive (it's not a low magnitude effect), so it's a question of whether an investment of that much time and vis is worth the savings and the effect.
For magical lighting, the challenge is in creating lights that do not disappear at sunset, as waiting in the dark for servants to drop by with the want is not acceptable; lights that can conveniently be turned on and off; lights that cost no Vis to create.
I like the idea of creating Moon-duration candles with a device. Candle disappearance is split between the new and the full moon, so you always have some around, and plenty of time to actually use them ... creating differently-colored wax depending on whether the candle disappears at the full moon or at the new moon shouldn't be too difficult. Plus, candles do not freak mortals out.
Of course, if you run the numbers, you'll find that it's not a low-level device (CrAn(He) 55: Base 5, +1M Touch, +3M Moon, +1M Herbam requisite? +10lv unlimited use). Just creating the wax (CrAn 50) and letting a craftsman work it, or directly using a wand of CrIg make-stuff-glow (CrIg 40) is certainly easier.
Under the abstract system used in Covenants, higher magnitude = more savings. Though you could always get multiple smaller items.
More "savings" per unit produced - but not a cheaper cost for the item.
Build the device - by my count, there is no need for any extra volume or magnitude, and it comes in at minimum at around Level 35, producing maybe 200 half-pound candles for Sun duration, each use/day.*
While some covenants might consume that much (or more), the cost in vis invested is still high, depending on that covenant's exact situation and priorities. Producing more only makes the initial cost higher - once you have "enough", you have enough.
8 vis for a Level 40 version that creates 2000/day is still 8 vis for "candles".
(* One "individual" is an amount equal to one animal body - I'm going off a generic 100 pd animal, size +0. If we go with "a cow carcass" worth of tallow, that's more like 500 pds, or more. If a beeswax candle... we run into some other questions...)
Are you creating candles, with a Group target and an Herbam wick? Or just a massive lump of wax? or of tallow? Because I don't get a level 35.
And the size of an individual's worth of beeswax is debatable given how it would create a single hair and the like.
A lvl 25 version produces a huge lump of tallow or beeswax (either type - up to size +1). I think he is aiming either for group (useful - allows multiple candles instead of a lump of wax) or unlimited uses - could still make candles, just let it make a candle each time you twist the handle...
Mind you, making a wand that creates torchlight with a ring duration is more sensable - comes out at lvl 20 for unlimited uses/day. These would last as long as you might desire...
However, a variant of Abe's idea might be more useful for firewood - since that would require herbam vis rather than ignem (Herbam being one of the most common vis sources in most sagas - maybe because it is one of the easiest ones to create a source for...)
As I said, 200 half-pound candles from a 100 pd "animal" unit - Group. But I did borf on the Herbam requisite for a wick - can't envision any Animal product that would suffice.
And I had not envisioned letting the candles burn all night long "just because" - altho' I suppose if you're going to run a magical household, that sort of thing becomes expected. But, yes, unless people are sleeping until the sun is up, Moon is the way to go, I'd agree, even if that does increase the necessary size of the individual candle to something more massive.
Lamp oil could work too - and since it mixes, a given lamp might suddenly drop in level at the appropriate moons, but it would rarely go dry then.
But here's my math for the candles, now with Herbam added -Candlemaker
CrAn(He) 40/40
(Base 5, +1 Touch, +3 Moon, +2 Group, +1 requisite, usable 1x/day)
This creates 50 2-pound* finished tallow candles with an Herbam(?) wick, that last for Moon duration. As any candle is guaranteed to last 2 weeks past the very next new/old moon, over a 2-week period 1400 candles can be maintained at a steady rate, and more for shorter periods.
(* A 2 pd candle is a fat cylinder about the size of a 20 oz/.6 ltr glass, which should last about two weeks(?) of steady burning.)
(If a covenant requires additional candles, this effect can easily be increased in design, but not after the fact.)I have no idea how long a tallow candle burns - I know that paraffin candles of the same size last "forever".
Wicks can be made of anything - and I mean ~anything~ - that has capillary action - braided lead was popular until recently, and tin and zinc are still used, as well as the more intuitive cotton and other fibers. (A wick works by capillary action, it doesn't "burn" except to burn away as the candle shrinks.) It's conceivable that an animal product, processed by magic, could work.
Good work on those ideas!
Another use for the wax mill could be to produce liquid wax as well as the wax granuales.