Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum
BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => EQUIPMENT USAGE, EXPERIMENTATION, HIVE PLANS, CONSTRUCTION TIPS AND TOOLS => Topic started by: adamant on June 06, 2013, 11:23:58 am
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Do you find a pail heater
Useful in your operation?
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Unfortunately it gets hotter than I like. If you get it above the honey line on a bucket it will melt plastic. That is much hotter than I ever want my honey... Putting a bucket of honey in a car in the sun with the windows up is better...
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I made a heater box out of some deep boxes I got cheap. It will hold four buckets. I heat it with two 15w bulbs. It stays 83 degrees in the insulated box.
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Up until this past year I would always sell out before the honey would crystallize. But, as we have started having honey later into the year I have found the pail heater useful. But, as Mr. Bush points out they do get pretty hot so you have to watch it. I recently bought a bottling tank and like it a lot better for reliquifing the honey. If you keep honey into the fall and winter you are going to eventually need a way to warm it up for bottling or reliquifying.
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I use a water bed heating pad set at 90 or 100. The are just long enough to wrap around a bucket and held in place with a pc of soft wire. The therm. bulb is then pushed down between the pad and bucket. Plug it in, set the temp and walk away