hiya omnimirage.
(declaration of conflict .. I sell extractors in these size ranges myself having gone through a similar process and not finding what I wanted available)
Perusing the extractors you linked:
- the ones labelled 'premium' I don't get, particularly what part is 'premium'. It is a radial but essentially relies on the frames to support each other rather than having frame baskets.
- the 8 frame 'one' from beekeepinggear is also curious as it's not 'one'. The first three photos are obviously of three different extractor models?
I used until recently an 8 frame radial extractor like this
https://www.ozbeegear.com.au/8-frame-electric-radial-honey-extractor.htmlIt is a fairly good size for my purposes as a one-person operation or sometimes with my daughter and only half a dozen hives (and absolutely hating extraction/painting/any-other-messy-job that runs too long and can't be finished in one episode)
The process of
- clearing one super at a time from hive in my backyard, clearing with a battery powered blower
- uncapping and holding uncapped frames in a plastic tub
- extracting
- draining from the extractor into 20kg buckets
- and returning the super to the hives to then grab the next one
operates fairly smoothly with no significant bottlenecks or choke points in the process.
with 40+ hives I'd be seriously tempted to look at a 12 frame unit like this
https://www.ozbeegear.com.au/12-frame-electric-radial-honey-extractor-1.html to move everything along a bit faster as well as being a bit more robust, solid and hands-free in operation.
(in recently switched to an 8 frame unit that is a smaller prototype/engineering-sample of that 12 frame unit scaled down to 8 frame size cos someone had to take one for the team and test it out)
Some things to pay attention to:
- you need to pay attention to and balance all of the bits in the extraction process including yourself. There is no use for instance having a huge extractor you can't keep operating because you can't uncap fast enough
- if you use or might use smaller frame sizes like wsp, manley or ideal pay attention to the frame supports/baskets to see if they will actually support such frames properly. Most of the cheaper ones (including it appears.. the ones you linked) will hold full depth but the other sizes are poorly supported and/or are unstable
- pay attention to just how solidly they are built and ask around about weak points
- think about what happens if a frame breaks or tips over (see the bit about frame supports above); in a solidly built extractor this will destroy the frame; in a crappy extractor you could end up destroying the extractor although radials are so simple there aren't 'too' many things to break.
- do you need to extract difficult honeys like tea tree or that has started to crystallize in the comb or have a penchant for super soft foundationless comb? If so radials may not be the best option as they have to apply more centrifugal force on the frame to throw the honey than tangential or semi-radial extractors (which in turn are laborious or way more expensive of course )
- I'm not sure what the rules are in Qld but in most Australian states you are not allowed to have honey in the extraction process in contact with materials like galvanised iron so pay attention to such stuff if you make your own; the days of putting an old 44 gallon drum into service as an extractor are over
- only you can determine the relative value and availability of your own time and effort vs capital outlay so what makes sense for you has to make sense to no-one but you.
eg Beekeeping is a hobby for me and I don't enjoy extracting and cleaning up after extracting so 'wasting' money buying equipment to reduce the time/effort/mess/inconvenience makes sense from the perspective of maximizing the bits I like about my hobby and minimizing the bits I don't. For some/many people (including myself at other times in my life/hobby/hobbies/bank-balance) that would not be true and they will happily crush and strain a few thousand kg of comb and honey each year and it'll make perfect sense to the only person it really needs to make sense to.