Rubbing wax onto frames

[omnimirage]

The other day, I needed some bees frames. I had the wooden-frame component, plastic foundation and beeswax, but didn't have a pan or anything to properly melt it. I put the wax in a metal bowl and placed it in the sun on a warm day, which made it a bit soft, and simply rubbed it onto my frames.

It seemed to have worked rather well. I now need to apply more wax. This time, I do have access to an electric frying pan, but I'm not sure if it'd be worth using it when the rubbing technique seemed to have worked.

Can I get away with just rubbing it, or is that less effective?

[BeeMaster2]

I have done both. I usually do this for swarm traps because they will fill out the 4 or 9 empty frames (I put in one drawn frame next to the side) in less than a week and the wax makes a big difference in getting straight comb. I find that when I melt the wax, that this helps to attract the scouts to the trap and it is much faster to do when I am making up a bunch of traps.
Jim

[GSF]

I can't say if rubbing is less effective. I melt my wax and paint it on with a paint brush. Make sure the wax isn't too hot or it'll warp the plastic foundation.

I seen a definite improvement in the comb drawing in comparison to frames that I didn't do anything to.

[Johnny]

I have a 2" angle iron 24" long with short legs welded on the ends of the angle iron
so it is a "v" shape.  Then I melt wax in it with a heat gun and dip my starter strips
in the melted wax.  I can do about 30 strips before I have to add more wax. I run
the heat gun across the bottom of the angle iron every once in awhile to keep the
wax hot.  It works great for me.

[Barhopper]

I use a double boiler. Dip the whole foundation

[sc-bee]

Several folks on the beemaster fb page draw it on like a crayon. They saw it does not have to be heated to soften just draw it on....