jottings from the hive in my front garden....I'm a new bee keeper with a thirst for the sweet things in life!

Wednesday 7 January 2015

Bees wax production - low tech!

Not everyone's idea of a fantastic photo opportunity I know, but it is pure beeswax, from one frame!




Ready to refine the bees wax from the sneaky one frame extraction yesterday.

  • Wax resting overnight in water to wash off excess honey.  ( I couldn't get any more off...I tried!)  It was a fine shavings consistency once washed!

  • Place on paper towel and into sieve, suspended above a bowl with some water
  • Into a lidded plastic storage container
  • put into car
  • time it for two consecutive days of 42C...
....and nothing happened! 




It got steamy, It softened but no melt!  (not like the YouTube clip at all)  I probably had too much wax in the sieve, and the white container probably didn't help...

So I grabbed an old clean tin from the recycle bin and melted it on the stove top, pouring through the sieve into a small takeaway container with water in it.

Result?  40 grams of wax!  Some residue - I forgot to photograph it, but there was some.  Still a bit of residue settled into the base of the wax as the sieve wasn't fine enough I guess.

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