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Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers

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  • From: Becky Bollinger <beckyalis AT gmail.com>
  • To: "Orange County, NC Beekeepers" <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [ocba] [Fwd: 2 great iPhotos]
  • Date: Mon, 09 Jun 2008 13:40:17 -0400


--- Begin Message ---
  • From: Jeff Sidle <iprnt4u AT ptd.net>
  • To: Becky Bollinger <beckyalis AT gmail.com>
  • Subject: 2 great iPhotos
  • Date: Mon, 9 Jun 2008 13:23:22 -0400
Becky,

I wanted to follow up with you since you were so kind as to give me some suggestions on handling the bees wax.

I did some more research on the web and found that you could make an extremely efficient solar melter with some recycled materials. This is the route I decided to go.

My first try was with some old burr comb that I had accumulated. It was full of the most ugly black gunk, dead bees, propolis, dirt, etc. A friend of mine had this really big styrofoam cooler and I had a very large piece of glass. I cut up some storm door screening and layered some cheesecloth over the screen and placed that over the top of an appropriately sized collection vessel. I aimed the contraption at the sun and placed the glass on top. Within two hours all the wax had melted thru the filtering material into the collector. It was very pure and that bright yellowish beeswax color. I carefully poured the liquid into a quart milk container with the top cut off to solidify overnight. SUCCESS.

I then took all of my drained cappings from last season and dumped them into a very large pot of warm water. I stirred them thoroughly and all the wax floated to the top and any residual honey sank or mixed with the water.

I then, with laytex gloves, scooped up handfuls of wax and made balls out of the floatsam about the size of baseballs (14 of them!). I had some more nasty looking burr comb which I also added to the water pot and made an additional 3 balls. I placed these on some newspapers to dry overnight.

I brought the contraption to my office today and placed 6 of these balls inside. They are melting as I write this.

I need to get the glass cut to the size of the opening. That will make it a little safer.


JPEG image


My solar wax melter


JPEG image


This is the nasty burr comb, which I also washed and made into balls, melting.

Thank you again for your assistance.

Jeff




--- End Message ---


  • [ocba] [Fwd: 2 great iPhotos], Becky Bollinger, 06/09/2008

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