building frames

randydrivesabus · June 12, 2006, 06:52:26 AM

i happily discovered the woodworking part of beekeeping by building a couple of mediums...ok...one is built and the other is waiting to be built. at least i got to use some of my woodworking tools that i hadnt used for a while (portable planer, jointer, table saw, router, drill press). i used some pine that i got from my own trees that was milled by one of those portable bandsaw mills. i want one of them.
is it worth it to build frames for my mediums or just buy them? they seem to be fairly reasonably priced to buy and they dont weigh that much so shipping shouldnt be too much. does anyone build their own?

Michael Bush · June 12, 2006, 08:07:05 AM

>is it worth it to build frames for my mediums or just buy them? they seem to be fairly reasonably priced to buy and they dont weigh that much so shipping shouldnt be too much. does anyone build their own?

If you want standard frames I think it's worth just buying them. If you want tighter spaced, foundationless frames, you might want to make them. I'd love to make a bunch of foundationless frames with 1 1/4" spacing.

Kris^ · June 12, 2006, 08:13:00 AM

My woodworking skills were nil before I began keeping bees. Bought everything the first year, built my boxes and bought frames the second. Shipping costs pushed the price per frame with foundation over $2 a frame, and I got some frames with warped top bars. I figured I could do better than that. So this year, using good quality 2X4s, I ripped out 100 or so frames, brood and super. They cost about 25 cents apiece for the medium frames, 30 for the brood frames. I used starter strips for the brood and wired foundation for the supers. They make good quality frames, and I provide my own quality inspection as I make them.

The biggest investment is time. It took several evenings to cut the frames out. It's a thing to do in the winter when you have some time on your hands, not when you're pressed to complete other tasks. I don't know if I would do it again if I could find a local supplier to pick up just a few dozen frames. Or a place to buy the frames dissasembled in bulk for a decent price. But if I do make more next year, I'll make larger runs of each part at a time. Once you get the tooling set up precisely, the process goes fairly quickly.

-- Kris

mastro · April 21, 2009, 12:19:00 AM

Quote from: Michael Bush on June 12, 2006, 08:07:05 AM
>is it worth it to build frames for my mediums or just buy them? they seem to be fairly reasonably priced to buy and they dont weigh that much so shipping shouldnt be too much. does anyone build their own?

If you want standard frames I think it's worth just buying them. If you want tighter spaced, foundationless frames, you might want to make them. I'd love to make a bunch of foundationless frames with 1 1/4" spacing.

Could you elaborate on the 1 1/4 spacing?

Hethen57 · April 22, 2009, 04:10:23 PM

I enjoy building the stuff, I'm kind of addicted to it and my wife probably thinks I'm crazy with all these hive bodies being created....but I would like to try building some frames. Would anyone share there secret for efficiently making frames from dimmensional lumber?, ie what stock you start to make the parts. If not, I'll see if I can come up with an efficient procedure for making them and share it with the group. For me, there is some additional pride of ownership when you make it yourself.

HomeBru · April 30, 2009, 05:06:12 PM

Son and I started this year and made all of our wooden-ware from dimensional pine. We started on frames :Tops and bottoms ripped from standard 3/4" and started milling the sides out of 2x8 material when we took a break for lunch and discovered that we were not saving any money and it was going to take about 20 hours to cut parts for 100 frames... Your mileage may differ.

We turned around and ordered the un-assembled frames to at least feel like we were still "building" our own..

J-

Robo · April 30, 2009, 05:15:54 PM

Quote from: Hethen57 on April 22, 2009, 04:10:23 PM
Would anyone share there secret for efficiently making frames from dimmensional lumber?, ie what stock you start to make the parts. If not, I'll see if I can come up with an efficient procedure for making them and share it with the group. For me, there is some additional pride of ownership when you make it yourself.

Some of the images appear to be gone, but perhaps this will help you
http://nordykebeefarm.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=16&PN=1&TPN=1

Hethen57 · April 30, 2009, 06:39:48 PM

Thanks so much Robo!...that is exactly what I was looking for.

oldenglish · May 01, 2009, 01:40:31 PM

Here is how they are doing it down in Columbia.

dpence · May 03, 2009, 12:50:02 AM

I challenged myself to figure out the jigs for mass producing frames. I bought a 3/4" wide blade for my band saw that really saves on re-sawing as mentioned. A radial arm saw, jointer, planer, router, drill press and a band saw are used so far. I have to build the jig for the top bars and that's it. Probably not time efficient but will help reduce the amount of scrap lumber lying around.

David

1reb · May 03, 2009, 07:23:59 PM

I gearing to make my frame too
Johnny

1reb · May 12, 2009, 01:01:20 PM

Oldenglish, the video gave me some ideas.

Johnny