Frame wire spool 13 Kg

01 · GAUGE

0.70 or 0.55? It depends how you tension

Both wire frames just as well; what changes is the feel of the job. The 0.70 mm is stiff: it takes more tension before yielding and leaves the comb very firm, which is what you want pulling with a ratchet tensioner, wiring frames in batches, or moving loaded hives. In exchange it goes less far —331 metres per kilo against 535— and takes more work to tame by hand. The 0.55 mm, on a 1 kg spool, is the one if you tension by hand or work in short batches. Rule of thumb: tensioning tool and volume, 0.70; hand and short runs, 0.55.

02 · TENSION

Tension: where the comb is won or lost

The wire is what holds the comb together when the extractor pulls on it with 2 kg of honey inside. Slack, the comb bows and works loose from the frame mid-extraction; that frame is not coming back, and in the middle of a honey-house day it means stoppages and honey on the floor. You have it right when the wire rings on being plucked and does not give under a finger. At this gauge, with a tensioner, you have room to pull hard without the wire snapping — but it does bite into the side bar, and that is where metal eyelets come in: they spread the load so the wire neither cuts in nor slackens as the timber dries.

03 · EMBEDDING

Tensioning is not enough: embed it into the wax

With the wire tensioned, the sheet of foundation is still loose against it. Embedding means melting the wax onto the wire so it ends up inside the comb: either by running current through the wire itself from a transformer — the practical route over hundreds of frames — or with a heated spur embedder drawn along it. Neither comes with the reel. It is the step that decides the result: well-supported foundation is drawn straight, while a sheet that moves comes out wavy and marks that frame for good.

04 · COVERAGE

How many frames the reel covers

The 4,300 metres cover roughly 2,215 Layens frames, 2,685 Langstroth, 2,045 Dadant brood or 2,735 shallow supers. Those figures assume four wires per frame; at five, count on somewhat less. An apiary of 200 hives replacing a third of its comb each year has reel enough for over four seasons.

05 · BEFORE YOU BUY