Honey Extractor RITMO® 9 super frames

01 · RADIAL OR TANGENTIAL

One machine, two ways of working

The three steel baskets sit two ways. In radial the frames stand edge-on, like the spokes of a wheel, and both faces come out at once: nine half-frames a load, without touching them.

In tangential the frame lies flat against the wall: it extracts one face only, so you have to turn the frames by hand to get the other. Three frames a load, but it is the position that empties an old or very full comb that would resist radially.

02 · WHICH FRAME GOES IN

160 mm radial, 300 tangential

The basket takes half-frames up to 160 mm tall in the radial position — Langstroth and Dadant shallow supers — and body frames up to 300 mm tangentially.

Hoffman frames go in without trouble, side spacers and all. What will not fit under any arrangement is a body frame radially: that calls for an extractor of larger diameter.

03 · WHAT IT IS MADE OF

And what comes in the box

It measures 525 mm across and 610 mm tall and weighs 24 kg. It comes with three detachable iron legs included, a food-grade plastic basket support, stainless rods and fasteners and acrylic lids — which are not decoration: they let you watch the load spin, which is how an unbalanced frame is spotted before it knocks.

The drive is manual, through a stainless helical gear.

04 · THE TAP, AND HONEY LEFT INSIDE

Two things worth knowing

The tap fitted as standard is 40 mm plastic. That is the 1½″ size, so anyone wanting to move to stainless has the replacement in the same figures — 40 the bore, 49 the thread.

And the rule that saves trouble: an extractor is not a settling tank. Move the honey to the tank as soon as the load is done; leaving it in there doubles the cleaning and ties up the machine on the day you need to carry on.

05 · BEFORE YOU BUY

It is a manual extractor for a small to medium apiary: