BroodMinder-W5 Half-Hive Scale

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262 .00 €

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Aluminium half-hive scale with the finest resolution in the range (5 g) and over 5 years of battery on AA cells. For stationary apiaries: it logs the weight every hour and sends it to your phone over Bluetooth so you can follow the flowering, the stores and swarming in detail, without opening the hive. Requires a levelling batten under the opposite end.

262 .00 €

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Details of BroodMinder-W5 Half-Hive Scale

A hive's weight curve tells you almost everything — the start of the flowering, the nectar coming in, the stores being eaten through over winter, or a swarm — and the best part is that you do not have to open the hive to read it. The BroodMinder-W5 is a half-hive scale made for the beekeeper whose hives sit in one fixed spot and who wants to understand them inside out without the outlay of a transport scale. A single aluminium bar that you slide under one end in minutes, with the finest resolution in the range and over five years of battery life. You fit it and start swapping guesswork for data.

🎯 5-gram resolution — right down to the daily foraging rhythm

A single 200 kg temperature-compensated load cell which, working as a half-hive scale, covers up to 400 kg of total hive weight. What sets it apart is the 5-gram resolution: with one reading per hour you see the colony's daily pulse — the weight drops at dawn as the foragers head out, and rises at dusk as they come back laden — and you follow the nectar coming in almost gram by gram through a bloom. The temperature compensation keeps the chill of the early morning or the midday heat from skewing the reading: what you see is honey, not the metal expanding. Detail that is impossible with scales of 50 or 100 g resolution.

🔋 Over 5 years of battery — fit it and forget it

It runs on standard AA batteries with a genuine life of over five years: no solar panels, no cables, no charge management. It logs one reading per hour and holds over a year of history in its memory. Syncing is over Bluetooth: you open the BroodMinder Bees app when you visit the apiary and it all downloads in seconds, with no connectivity fees. If later on you want to see the curve in real time from home, adding a BroodMinder Hub automates the upload over the mobile network and enables alerts; and if you add a brood sensor on top, the app combines the two readings into a Nectar Index that tells whether a stall in the curve is a lack of flowering or a problem inside the hive.

⚠️ One installation requirement you must not skip

The half-hive format lets one person fit it without lifting the whole stack: you raise one end of the hive slightly, slide the scale underneath and that is it. But the opposite end needs a 60 mm wooden batten (or an equivalent angle profile) to keep the hive level so the load cell works properly. It is a thirty-second job; skip it and the hive sits tilted and the readings drift. It is the golden rule of monitoring: the finer the data, the more it matters how you install it — and the W5 gives the finest data in the range. That is why it is ideal for stationary apiaries, where you control the footing of every hive. If you do migratory work with frequent changes of site, the two-bar BroodMinder-W4 scale will suit you better.

🏗️ 5 mm aluminium that stays put season after season

The European version does away with structural plastics: the profile is 5 mm-wall aluminium, with no parts that degrade in the sun or in the field's temperature swings, and the electronics encapsulated and protected from damp. At 53 × 60 × 430 mm it sits discreetly under the hive and needs no extra casing. This is not a scale to replace in three seasons: it is built to stay, and it is backed by a 2-year guarantee.

📋 Technical Specifications

Type	Half-hive scale — 1 load cell
Material	5 mm aluminium profile (European version)
Dimensions	53 × 60 × 430 mm (width × height × length)
Load cell	200 kg, temperature-compensated
Total hive capacity	400 kg
Resolution	5 g
Battery	Replaceable standard AA batteries, over 5 years
Logging	1 reading/hour (configurable); over 1 year of storage
Connectivity	Bluetooth; compatible with the BroodMinder Hub (mobile network)
Data	BroodMinder Bees app and MyBroodMinder.com (iOS / Android)
Installation	Half-hive; requires a 60 mm batten under the opposite end
Recommended use	Stationary apiaries
Guarantee	2 years