What is the best way to extract frames without an extractor?? Should i use a light to warm up the frames and then uncap them and let them gravity drain ??
I guess you want to save the the comb, without crush and strain. Put the open frames in a bucket and spin it round and round with your arm over your head. Takes a little less time than letting it drip out, but is very hard on you.
Quote from: Allen on January 18, 2011, 10:22:00 PM
I guess you want to save the the comb, without crush and strain. Put the open frames in a bucket and spin it round and round with your arm over your head. Takes a little less time than letting it drip out, but is very hard on you.
I actually saw something as you describe it was a vid of some impoverish country and the guy had this leather sack and tied a rope to it and swung it around over his head in a big circle and it worked --believe it or not-- :lol:
RDY-B
I have quite a few deep drawn frames that i want to extract from a dead out this winter. I want to extract these frames and give two frames to each of my packages so the queen can get to work imediately ;)
I never had any luck extracting without an extractor. You can do crush and strain, but that's not extraction as you destroy the drawn comb.
http://bushfarms.com/beesharvest.htm#crushandstrain (http://bushfarms.com/beesharvest.htm#crushandstrain)
I'm not sure where I found it...maybe youtube...but there is a video out there of a very simple extractor. A box big enough to hold the frame is mounted to a broom handle at about the mid point. The frame is placed in the box tangentially and the "stick" is set down in a hole drilled in a 2x6 or other board and the top of the stick is held loosely while moving your hand in small circles making the whole thing rotate and spin the honey out. The box has to be emptied of honey often.
It looks like it's as easy as it gets but I imagine it to be really messy.
Scott
The quickest, easiest, almost mess free way of doing crush and strain is with a cider press.