My Poly Nucs

[Bush_84]

I've got them cut glued and the first coat of paint on! 



I'm not done painting so don't judge my paint job yet lol.  I hope to have a bunch of 5 frame equipment and a few 3 framers around for queen mating/storing.  I've got the three frame nucs gluing right now.  I also have some more 5 frame stuff cut but not assembled.  Either way I couldn't help but post this.  I'm excited to get them in use!

[BlueBee]

Some of the nicest looking Nucs I’ve seen in a while. :)  Well done!  X:X

Looks like 2” thick foam from here? 

Does your design accommodate electrical heating?

Here’s a small batch of foam nucs I made a couple years ago.  Looks a little bit like yours.





Bees did pretty well in them

[Bush_84]

The floor has a little height.  It might be able to take a heat tape.  I'm not sure.  Either way I could make a little shim if needed. 

I've always prided myself on functional equipment, but not the prettiest.  Lol.  I'm still trying to get the gorilla glue amount correct.  And yes they are 2" thick.  The thinner stuff was quite a bit cheaper, but the 2" had the higher psi stuff.  I like the green better than my white.  Was to lazy to stop and have them add color, but life will go on.

[Bush_84]

Glued and unpainted 3 frame mating nucs.  Probably only going to make just the two of those. 

[ScituateMA]

How do you make the frame rest? Glidden gripper primer/sealer works very well for gluing too and it is inexpensive

[BlueBee]

I’ve done the frame rests many ways, but I always use some form of solid material; usually wood for that critical area.  Here’s a close up photo of what I used on those Gen 4 foam nucs.  The bees are going to glue the frames down to the rests so IMO you need something solid that will support some prying and some scraping. 



That’s a great tip on the primer. X:X  I’m going to give it a try.  Lord knows it sticks like glue to your hands after painting!

[ScituateMA]

Bluebee, im making heat mat with resistors and I think im gonna try to coat the wires, resistors with number 2 plastic (versus cement). Milk jugs are made of number 2 plastic.  One sheet of number 2 plastic and then heating elements and another sheet of plastic like a sandwich then heat it in oven till 375 f. It turns out like a rock and free and thin enough to slide inside of bee hive from entrance

[Bush_84]

Well after spending most of my day painting, cutting, and assembling, I have 5 nuc hives assembled.  I have 4 nuc boxes, 1 floor, and 1 roof painted.  I have 3-4 coats on.  That must be enough.  It looks completely white.  I have a single coat on a few roofs.  Due to the width of the poly sheets I am able to make one cover with the overhangs and one migratory cover per cut.  I don't think it's a big deal to use migratory covers and it saves a lot of material.  I still have a whole sheet of the stuff.  I have to make floors and roofs for the 3 framers that I made, but that shouldn't take much time/material.  Painting is the pain.  I wish my kids were old enough to pay them to paint for me lol. 

Right now I have a nuc and a production hive left.  I plan on keeping them loaded up on sugar syrup and pollen patties for the next two months.  Hopefully they build up nicely.  I plan on getting two packages in May.  Then I will get a queen or two when picking up packages and make a split or two.  They will go into my new nucs!

[Bush_84]

http://i993.photobucket.com/albums/af52/dpboll/097c75144481aaf0bb8991f4e9e568f0_zps57aca455.jpg

Well that's what I have thus far. I have two 3 frame nucs for queen rearing.  Each with a single hive body, roof, and floor.  I have five sets of 5 frame roofs and floors.  I have seven five frame hive bodies.  All equipment is deeps.  As you can see I have an unpainted deep and roof.  I still have quite a but of material left, but my garage is finally clean.  Not sure I want to go and cover it with small poly beads again.  Lol.  I'll probably use it to build a few more hive bodies, but I'm not sure I'll even fill what I currently have.  If the weather is as good as promised tomorrow I'll put one of the nucs in use.  I have an over wintered nuc I'm going to move to one of these poly nucs. 

[Robo]

I'm interested in seeing how these work for you.  Every time I have tried using the medium density insulation board (blue or pink)  the bees have chewed right through it.  I have made some nucs with it,  but lined the inside with luan and coroplast.  Although they did work OK, they are no where near as robust as the Beemax nucs.

[ScituateMA]

What if we coat the inside of the poly hive with bee wax to prevent bees chewing it ? Has anyone tried it ?
Just came to my mind,  what do you think ?

[BlueBee]

Unfortunately Robo is right.  If the density of bees gets too high (nuc too strong), the bees will start carving out foam to make room for more comb.  I’ve got boxes where they completely chewed out a side to build a new comb.  To prevent this problem you either have to face the interior surface with something, of you have to be very diligent watching the hives and splitting before they get too strong.  The bees overwhelm small nucs pretty quickly. 

I’ve got some 30 unfaced foam nucs in use (see photos above) and they do work well, but once it’s time to replace them, the next ones will be faced with something inside.  I also used thinner foam for my mating nucs since I didn’t intend to overwinter them at the time.  They don’t need a lot of insulation for summer use.  My thinking is, if you want to overwinter a mating nuc that is 4 mediums or less, then it’s cheaper and more reliable to go with electric heat.

I would bet my last dollar that coating the interior foam with bees wax wouldn’t stop them.  The bees harvest bee wax from frames/foundation all the time.  Thick paint, or poly, would slow them down a bit.

[BlueBee]

Well after spending most of my day painting, cutting, and assembling, I have 5 nuc hives assembled. 

Bush, you’re a foam building MACHINE!  Congrats, they look good. X:X

[rbinhood]

I'm interested in seeing how these work for you.  Every time I have tried using the medium density insulation board (blue or pink)  the bees have chewed right through it.  I have made some nucs with it,  but lined the inside with luan and coroplast.  Although they did work OK, they are no where near as robust as the Beemax nucs.

I know a guy who builds these and uses aluminum flashing to line the inside and it seems to work very well.

[Robo]

For the last ones I built,  I started by making frames rails in some 3/4" pine and made a box with Luan.   Then I assembled 2" foam around the wood core.   Once dry,  a glued a piece of coroplast as a floor and a piece of mylar (emergency blanket)  to the underside of the top.   This way they had no access to the foam to chew threw.







Rob...