Stupid Mistake

[Kev]

This is my first go at beekeeping, and I glued the beemax hives together wrong. (I also tried to pick the banjo with my fingerpicks on upside down, but that's a different story.) Once you all stop laughing, I hope you'll give me some advice. 

Here's what happened:
I flipped the sides upside down when I assembled the hives and supers. This makes the end panels sit about 1/4" higher than the side panels. The supers nest quite nicely because assembling them this way creates an offset. There's no change in the bee space between the frames. The only real issue is where the hive meets the bottom board. In the hive body, the frames are about 3/4" above the bottom board instead of 3/8-1/2". Also, the entrance is bigger and there's a 1 /4" gap at the back of the hive where it should meet the bottomboard.

How much of a problem is this? I plan to use strips of wood to reduce the entrance and to fill in that gap. I hope the bees won't care too much. Any advice (sympathy) for me?

Kev

[sean]

Doesn't sound like it should be a problem. I am not that technically minded therefore oncew given the choice i buy the assembled boxes and frames. There is a reason God made carpenters LOL.

[Kirk-o]

Yeah I've done things like that before.Thats the school of hard knocks
keep going
kirk-o

[Jerrymac]

I guess there is no way to hammer the boxes apart with out splitting things all to pieces. I have lots of room at the bottom. So far no problem. The worse that could happen is they build comb and lay eggs in it but chances are they won't unless you let them run out of room. You could close up the back opening with a strip of wood, and it would probably be best to reduce the entrance the same way.

The real problem is if you build all the rest of your equipment correctly these will not be interchangeable.

[Kev]

I guess there is no way to hammer the boxes apart with out splitting things all to pieces. I have lots of room at the bottom. So far no problem. The worse that could happen is they build comb and lay eggs in it but chances are they won't unless you let them run out of room. You could close up the back opening with a strip of wood, and it would probably be best to reduce the entrance the same way.

The real problem is if you build all the rest of your equipment correctly these will not be interchangeable.

Thanks to all who replied. I'll sleep better.

These are the foam ones, so I could heat up a putty knife and get them apart, but it would be pretty messy.

You're right, they won't interchange nicely. (Fortunately I only have 2 hives and 4 supers) Frankly I'm already thinking about gradually switching to wood.

Kev

[IndianaBrown]

While putting my beemax hives together last year I briefly had them wrong myself.  It is easy to do.  However the glue looked like a bit of a waste, so I never bought it. 

From http://betterbee.com/products.asp?dept=252

Hint: We have found the dovetails on the BeeMax® hives so tight that it was not mandatory to glue them. However, we do have some customers who have done so to increase the strength of the locked corner and gain some more peace of mind.

The stryofoam is very thick and the interlocking pieces are hard enough to put together without glue.  My hives seem to be completely sturdy without it.  I guess if I were moving my hives around for pollination etc. I would consider gluing them, but otherwise it does not seem necessary.