Subject: Solar Wax Extractor

From: [email-masked] (Grey Lynn Housing Trust)
Date: 13 Jul 1995 17:55:59 GMT

Can any one help with plans or location of plans for a simple solar wax extractor.
Thanks,
Terry Gosset

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From: [email-masked] (Andy Nachbaur)
Date: Thu, 13 Jul 1995 15:06:00 GMT

G>From: [email-masked] (Grey Lynn Housing Trust)
 >Subject: Solar Wax Extractor

G>Can any one help with plans or location of plans for a simple solar wax extra
 >or.

                             HINT FOR THE HIVE #111

          SOLAR BEESWAX RENDERING AND HINTS FOR EXHIBITING WAX BLOCKS

        When it comes to rendering beeswax, nothing works like a solar wax
extractor or melter.  The melter can be made from almost any materials found
around the beekeeper's establishment and adapted to any size apiary.

        The principles of wax extractor design are always the same, although
the details of each specific apparatus may differ.  Bits of wax, old comb and
other scrapings from the hive are placed on a slated (usually) metal tray
inside the box, the wax melts and drips off the tray into a collector pan.  The
pan usually has slanted sides, facilitation removal of the wax block once it
hardens.

        Usually, the inside of the extractor is painted black to absorb as much
radiation as possible, facilitating heat buildup inside the melter.  The melter
should always be bee tight; honey bees are usually attracted to the odor of
melting wax (often there is honey adhered to the wax) and this promotes robbing
during nectar dearth.

        It is generally agreed the best way to put up good beeswax for show in
fairs and other events is to render it in a solar extractor.  Wax is judges on
several criteria including:  color, cleanliness and freedom from honey,
propolis and other adulterants; uniformity of appearance; and freedom from
cracking or shrinking.

        The best colored (light yellow) beeswax comes from that rendered from
cappings: wax from old combs is often quite dark.  Bleaching in the sun will
often lighten the color of rendered wax.

        Generally, wax from a melter is quite clean.  The longer it stays
liquid with the resultant settling of foreign materials, the cleaner it will
become.  This can be accomplished in the wax extractor or in a warm turned off
oven.  Once a cake of wax has hardened, detritis can be scraped off the bottom
and if necessary, the cleaning process repeated.

        Uniformity and absence of cracks in a wax block because of shrinkage is
minimized by allowing beeswax to cool very slowly.  The preferred mold is a
bread pan with slanted sides.  Once a cake is ready for submitting to a judge,
do not touch it (fingerprints will cause points to be subtracted), but wrap it
in plastic.

           THE PRINTED VERSION SHOWS A PLAN FOR A SOLAR WAX EXTRACTOR