Making 11 langstroth hives out of scrap timber

So what do you do with an over supply of donated timber from a worksite to my school?

Some would see (most of my students!!) Too much effort to process and redirect to a functional use

 

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 Over the last few weeks of holidays, I have had a more positive approach to the use of the timber

 But here is a short context and background before we put saw to timber

 My Top bar hives are doing well - mishaps and losses along the way, as usually, this bee game has its ups and downs

 Once.....

A fallen branch that becomes a bridge above the greased stand legs giving access to the hive by 1000s and 1000s of green ants

So disappointing to see almost half the hive dead or being torn apart with a green ant on each leg of the bees being "drawn and quartered". 

 Due to the high number of ants in the hive itself not just on and around it - I pulled apart the hive and transferred the brood and honey frames into a spare hive, regrease the legs and brush away all the ants above the greased legs - don’t know if this one would be saved.  

 This episode started me thinking about getting more serious with my hives, splitting more often, creating more hives - more intentionally (thus the need for more hives to fill with bees!)

 Then the mind starts ticking over when I see all this timber at school - far more than needed (if at all) for the limited work students do in size, qty and form since I stopped teaching woodwork to focus on teaching 3D design, Engineering and 3D printing. No more coffee tables for 38 students in a semester (just not enough storage area or truth be told "care factor" by students to strive for excellence - their words - "too much work and effort, why not buy it"! 5 didn’t complete their tables and another 5 didn't even bother to take their coffee table home once completed - pathetic really!)

 Another impetus for my recent woodworking activity with the second hand timber – was a recent splitting of my large TBHs that were full to over flowing with bees and honey - and a huge flowering of gum trees about to commence – was the limited honey harvested and the large number of people who wanted some of the limited liquid gold.

 Yes, if I hadn’t split hives and used the honey to feed the new splits there would have been more. But the down side of top bar hives is the brood that is usually in the centre of every frame if you don’t create a queen exclusion area. Which I haven’t done as honey is not the main reason I do TBHs. Rather just the plain enjoyment of keeping and watching the bees (except when being attacked by green ants!).

 So, to get more honey – I should go more commercial in my approach. Langstroth Hives is the best option based on what brother-in-law is doing locally and my internet research.

But expensive, to buy it is $350-450 for base, brood and 2 supers, then the frames at $1.70-3.00 each and 30 for a hive plus some spares, then the bees to go in – them – it all adds up to over $800-900– but I am not paying for brand new. Second hand is fraught with untold dangers – so that’s out too.

 If I make the Langstroth hives – I have the skills and access to some average equipment at school (not exactly precision perfect).

 Plus I am broke –well not broke broke but no money spare for nothing. Got to save $300 for upcoming fly fishing tournament. Plus, the girls are getting into horses more – so will need a horse of their own (uggghhhh!) eventually for barrel racing – I think! Still no boat to go fishing whenever, rather relying on a mate with a boat. I also need to replace my ute which is now over 10years old, done over 270000kms and is feeling its age through my abuse of it.

 All I was rich in was time during the school holidays and a pile of timber at the school.

plus I got to keep my mind ticking over - exploring, researching, surmising, calculating, optimising - the list goes on infinitum  on at least a couple of ideas at a time (the other one currently is expanding my bonsai collection significantly to a mini commercial basis)

 So during the last week of school I set about to design a way I could use the 1.6m long by 138mm x 36mm planks from packing material for glass sheets for an upgrade on a high rise building in town.

 I researched sizes and form of Langstroth hives, construction methods and processes – the key measurement was to ensure I could swap frames from my TBHs and my brothers-in-law commercial hives if needed.

 Paramount importance was everything had to conform to the planks I had available.

 So first it was multiple sketches and estimates – which way to cut, shape and form the plethora of pieces needed to construct the hives and the frames. Adding widths and saw cut waste widths to see how many pieces can fit it the timber if cut this way or another way.

 I then tested the theories, sketches and ideas by designing it on CAD software. Each part made and assembled. This highlighted issues and production plan changes. Some right back to the starting point.

Below is the shallow super end piece

below is the full assembly of all the parts - brood box, 3 supers lid, base and all the frames

even has a logo I can add once I get the CNC machine going

 

So with the measurements and cutting plan all sorted as too the most efficient concept of a construction plan – I head to the woodwork room

 With the number of planks needed calculated - the first task is to pull apart the planks and extract the countless four inch nail gun nails out of the timber.

 Using a short pry bar the short cross pieces are removed and the nails hammered back through the timber for the pry bar claw tip to pull out

Over 3 kilo of nails eventually were weighed that were removed from the timber –

 

Once the right amount of planks prepared – ensuring limited knots and twists in the still greenish timbers – the planks selected for the brood boxes were ripped on the table saw on one edge to prepare them to be glued together to create the depth needed for the side pieces

These were clamped together in pairs (but several on the one set of long sash clamps) once glue applied to the newly sawn edges and left over night

 

Then the cross cut drop saw was employed to cut all the lengths needed – for shallow frames ends, standard frame ends, top bars and ends bars. Then the sides and ends of the main boxes cut to size.

 Point of note:

While the brood box would be the usual Langstroth depth, due to the thickness of the planks for the boxes I was only going to make shallow super boxes. You see if I had of split the planks into two the timber would be only 16mm thick (plus I didn't have a table saw or other tool good enough to do this), so stayed with the 36mm thickness which in turn added weight the box itself – so having shallow supers reduced the amount of weight once filled with honey. This all being so, every choice has a consequence – so instead of two normal sized supers, I planned to have three shallow supers. The weight of the brood box doesn’t come into it as it is rarely moved once set up. (plan to have them 10 of these hives on a trailer that can be moved about – only exchanging shallow supers as required for honey harvesting)

 Once everything cut to size to the quantities needed - the router table came into extensive use

 The two different lengths of pieces for end frames (90x at 130mm and 28x at 230mm) required a 16mm channel on bottom end grain and then a 22mm on the top end grain – these pieces were then cut 8 mm wide on a new blade in the big bandsaw (was going to use table saw but too small a length for table saw which would send the pieces flying if the table saw used). These pieces were again passed over the router, once on each side after a different set up done to take away the bee space that is needed between the frames.

 

 Below is the ends of the supers rebated for the ledge the honey frames would rest on and on ends where the other sides will join. no fancy dovetail joint but simple rebate, 

all sides now ready for assembly on a custom “box jig”

I made a box jig to ensure boxes square and easy to put together – made the task very efficient

glue in rebate, clamp both directios, 

then used a gas brad gun with skewed 50mm nails from two angles to re-enforce glue  

take out of jig and repeat 43 more times

 

Now comes the fiddly bits and lots of them – 11 boxes – one brood and 3 supers. That’s 40 frames per box. So that’s 440 frames – or 440 top bars, 440 bottom bars, plus deep ends and shallow ends – two per frame.- 880x - plus a heap of extras just incase.

next task was lots of cut passes on the table saw – so I spent five hours slicing up the 500 plus top bars - first into 8mm thick slices then pass through again at 27mm wide – the off cut of 5-6mm x 8mm would suit being the foundation lock strip – helpful byproduct!

 

 Then the bottom bars needed a similar task but with less time by half, with each 8mm (actually 9mm for bottom bars) cuts giving two bottom bars of 16mm, that could fit into first cut of the 36mm depth planks with a 4mm table saw cut up the middle – perfect!   But another pass over each of the bottom with the table saw was required to give a slot for the foundation (if used) to sit 

 

For this I need extra hands – so made a couple of jigs and got a mate to help me

We worked around each other to complete 500 frames (60 extras) over two days, but in less than a day overall time wise - place 10 in frame, add drop of glue, lay in bottom bar, use air gun to add a nail or two. flip this over, add drop of glue, place in top bar, use air gun to add a nail or two. pull out locking bars and transfer finished frames to a hive box. This was done 44 times and 6 more times for the spare frames.

Over the two weeks working a few hours most weekdays - we actually did about 5 or so 8 hours day overall

Which isn’t bad for 11 hives, worth a minimum of $400 each (yes plenty of flaws and twists but very usable)

Would not make the frames from scratch again with this timber – too green, too many twists and bends to compensate for, too much sap, too many knots in the pine to avoid impacting end result

The boxes are heavier but manageable -advantages are the thicker sides will insulate very well the sun warming the outside surfaces

But cheap timber is cheap timber, especially this cheap thus you live with the flaws or don't bother

 So every hive box had a full compliment of frames for each hive's brood and supers boxes plus an extra frames in case (30 deep, 30 shallow)

Now the frames need a bit more to be done – due to me going foundationless - this is not using a sheet of beeswax for bees to form comb out from in each frame.

For a 180-190 sheets of foundation is $450-490 plus freight – and given also the heat up here all that might arrive would be a 14kilo lump of beeswax - I need 400 plus frames so at least two lots of that 14kilo of foundation - keep in mind don't want to spend any money!

 So foundationless it is and leave the comb building entirely to the bees with some encouragement

To accomplish this now adding paddlepop sticks to top bar for bees to use as the start of their comb once I brush it with melted beeswax to encourage comb building

with appropriately drills holes just the right size - I also added two bamboo skewers from top to bottom evenly spaced along the top and bottom bars - that the comb will encase – this to hopefully enforce the comb when spinning off the honey – the spacing of the skewers still allows me to cut out honeycomb for containers rather then spin all the honey out

Still got bases and lids to make – another post on that soon

Then too the painting and the use

Then the whole idea for all this work can happen – harvest more honey!