The Honey Factory

[R2elk]

What kind of wood did you use?

Douglas Fir is what is available here.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Definitely warmer! 55 or warmer is what I heard, and not raining. Someone asked this at a bee meeting. The answer was, "Think of it like this. You're on the top floor of your house, wearing nothing but your undies. The only way to keep warm is to rub your arms and move around, and that is enough to keep you warm. Now, I'm going to take the roof off your house and peek in. Do you want me to do that on a warm day, or a chilly day, and what if it's raining?"

He added, "Suit up, have a helper, and be quick about it. The girls are in a pissy mood this time of year."

I am planning on installing the feeder on Saturday. The forecast is 18° (64F), plenty of sunshine and a light wind from the south-south-west. I will leave the garage door open.
Remove off the outer and inner cover and set the feeder on top with its central channel closed with a paper strip.
Depending on how many escapees there are i will or i won't open the entrance. I just have to pull the reducer outwards for about 5 millimeters and they can get in and out.
Then i leave the garage door open until the temperatures have dropped down to 5° (41F) and close the entrance.
Fill up both compartments with syrup, insert the floats, add the inner cover, quilt box, outer cover and then pull the paper strip out to open the bee banquet. 6 liters of syrup plus what they have in the honey-super should be enough to last until the end of March next year.

 

[R2elk]

Miter joints need no rigs, dowels dominos, splines, …, just two 45° cuts, glue, pressure, done!

You will find out different. When I do big miter joints, I use a biscuit joiner with them. You do need multiple clamps, I recommend corner clamps along with bar clamps and a square to make sure everything comes out square and level.

If your wood isn't perfect it can be difficult to get the miter joints to come out right. I found butt joints easier to deal with.

 

[R2elk]

Folks at the box-stores are telling me that a miter saw is more flexible to use, so i should get a miter saw first.

The only thing a miter saw has over a table saw is portability. You can do everything a miter saw can do with a table saw plus much more. You can make much longer miters with a table saw than you can with a miter saw.

You can't make those ledge cuts with a miter saw. You can make them with a table saw. Of course you could get a router too and make them with the router.

They want to sell you the miter saw first because they know you won't be in a hurry to buy one if you already have a table saw.

As for a band saw, I almost never use mine.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Those boxes are excellent! Love the looks and the handles. When I built my nucs out of rough cut I glued and screwed butt joints and those things have held up for 15 years and still look great. The commercial finger joint boxes that I have a few are rotting and falling apart on the joints and are less than 10 years old.

Same experience here: The boxes that i have with finger joints have started to rot from the joints and two of my honey supers are leaking water into the hive during heavy rain.
I will sand everything down, apply wood putty where necessary and then re-paint them. Will last 2-3 years longer.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Douglas Fir is what is available here.

That's the best wood you can use for bee-hives! - So i have been told. Its light-weight and easy to work with but very rot resistant.
I assume for my first experiments i will just use the 2 by x stuff from the big box stores and gather experience. Owning a saw-mill - even a very simple one - is one of my dreams. I have a lot of Sycamore and Tulip trees on my landwhose wood is not as good as the Douglas Fir but okay if properly treated.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

You will find out different. When I do big miter joints, I use a biscuit joiner with them. You do need multiple clamps, I recommend corner clamps along with bar clamps and a square to make sure everything comes out square and level.

If your wood isn't perfect it can be difficult to get the miter joints to come out right. I found butt joints easier to deal with.

To be honest, i already planned to start with butt joints and then learning to make some good miter joints. I already have corner clamps, otherwise i wouldn't know how to force two pieces of wood together at a 90° angle.
In those ancient times. my uncle was using some kind of angle rig to get the corners correct and then applied pressure using ratcheting straps. And boy those were under some pressure! Once a strap broke and the lock went straight to his wooden garage door…
There will be a lot of learning and practicing for me, but it will be fun. If i could live my life again i would choose to become a carpenter of some kind. I just love to work with wood!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

The only thing a miter saw has over a table saw is portability. You can do everything a miter saw can do with a table saw plus much more. You can make much longer miters with a table saw than you can with a miter saw.

You can't make those ledge cuts with a miter saw. You can make them with a table saw. Of course you could get a router too and make them with the router.

They want to sell you the miter saw first because they know you won't be in a hurry to buy one if you already have a table saw.

As for a band saw, I almost never use mine.

Thank you very much for sharing your experience!
I assume with ledge cuts you mean the recess for the frames to hang on? - I was planning to buy a router anyways. Imho it is a very essential tool if you want to make shelves or small furniture with round edges to please ones hands. Of course a chisel, a rasp and some sandpaper will do too... - At the time of my uncle there were no electric power-tools available. You should have seen his home made wood-lathe, powered by a Volkswagen Bug…

 

[R2elk]

Thank you very much for sharing your experience!
I assume with ledge cuts you mean the recess for the frames to hang on? - I was planning to buy a router anyways. Imho it is a very essential tool if you want to make shelves or small furniture with round edges to please ones hands. Of course a chisel, a rasp and some sandpaper will do too... - At the time of my uncle there were no electric power-tools available. You should have seen his home made wood-lathe, powered by a Volkswagen Bug…

The other thing you can't do with a miter saw is to rip the boards to the right width.

I believe the dimensions for the hive bodies and medium supers were chosen because they were the standard dimensions for 2"x10"s and 2"x6"s originally. Those dimensions have changed. Now you need to rip down 2"x12"s for hive bodies and 2"x8"s for medium supers.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

The other thing you can't do with a miter saw is to rip the boards to the right width.

I believe the dimensions for the hive bodies and medium supers were chosen because they were the standard dimensions for 2"x10"s and 2"x6"s originally. Those dimensions have changed. Now you need to rip down 2"x12"s for hive bodies and 2"x8"s for medium supers.

Thank you very much for bringing this to my attention! - I could use my power-tool circular saw to cut the hive walls to size after i have cut them to the correct length and angle. However a hand tool is never as precise as a fix-mounted one.
Maybe buy both saws at once HBF instead of Dewalt…
Guess i need to buy a 2x12 and do a dry run with the hand saw.