Extractor advice..?

[texanbelchers]

Has anyone tried a plastic uncapping needle roller and did you like it vs a hot knife ?   

I prefer the roller over a cold knife; haven't used a hot one.  It eliminates the scratcher.  The drawback is it doesn't level the comb.  Minimal wax to deal with.

[chorrylan]

Does anyone have any experience with the honey paw slit uncapper?
https://hiveworks.com.au/products/honey-paw-slit-uncapper
They look to work pretty well for smallish scale beekeepers, similar in price to an uncapping plane I guess so expensive vs knives.
They seem to have two "advantages"
1. Can handle uneven and low comb surfaces with ease
2. Don't remove the cappings so you don't have to deal with them. ..

but you also don't get the wax and i have a lot of use for it so this is the main bit holding me back. Oh as well as the price and need for steam.

In regard to extractors. I'm at the opposite end of the scale to Michael.
I want the extraction excercise over and done with in a single process and minimal cleanup and minimal effort. So... get the biggest electric,  radial extractor you can afford and fit through door is my motto :-)
Having to spend several hours each evening repeatedly setting up, extracting and cleaning up because I chose to buy  a small manual, tangential  extractor too small to do the job in one go took the fun out of it and put me off beekeeping for a few decades

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[Acebird]

Does anyone have any experience with the honey paw slit uncapper?

350 in place of a 10 dollar scraper?  Have you ever seen more perfect frames?

[chorrylan]

350 in place of a 10 dollar scraper?

Yes it seems expensive but "if" it's faster, easier and does a better job and the bees refill frames faster as they're less damaged  then a comparison needs to put a value on that to determine whether it justifies the capital cost difference.


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[Acebird]

I consider a knife (hot or cold) to be an advantage because it cuts the high spots off and make the frame even rather then follow the undulations of the comb.  As the bees reuse the frames they fill in the low spots and the high spots get cut even again.  If you don't take the high spots off you can get interlocking frames in successive years.
I believe it is the size of the colony and how strong the flow is that determines how fast bees fill frames even if there is no comb in the frame.