Insulating my hives.

[Mklangelo]

I have this R-15 insulation that is foil covered on both sides.  Since it's shiny will the fact that it will reflect sunlight cost me more natural warming of the hive than just leaving it uncovered?  The hives are painted white so maybe it's not that much sun-heat absorbtion I may loose?  I'd like some thoughts on that.


And what would be the best way to insulate my inner cover, since once I wrap the hives, that will be the condensation point and I don't want that to be right over the ball of bees, as Finsky pointed out in his excellent post about winterization.

For the Inner Cover, my first thought was a few layers of newspaper but that sounds too easy and cheap to be true!!!   lol


Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

[Finsky]

  Since it's shiny will the fact that it will reflect sunlight cost me more natural warming of the hive than just leaving it uncovered?

Coldest time is  night and morning. 

And what would be the best way to insulate my inner cover, since once I wrap the hives,

There is great argue about BEST. Beekeepers are ready to fight for it.

I use 10 mm wooden board and I have 70 mm foam plastic over wooden frame. It is on hive all year around.  (old matress)

I have tried many but mice like many stuffs and they make a nest over the hive. They are not able to dig foam plastic.

Insulating boards are good but bees tend to chew them during few months. 


Wooden boards are in good condition tens of years and they are easy to  clean  with propane flame.
I take proper wooden panel from rubbish. You may cut 10 mm x 50 mm slices from wood with table saw.

When you make that wooden inner cover box, you may use many kinds of insulating material - news paper too - when you protect the insulation against mice.  You may put queen excluder over insulation. You may put old pillow there - covered.

My inner cover is upp side down between boxes. Inner cover must stand opening when burr has clued it fast.

Then you must have a ventilated gap between inner cover insulation and outer cover. Wind blows throught it

[Mklangelo]

I think I'll get some foam plastic and set it on top of the inner cover.

Thanks for the info Finsky.

[CBEE]

dont think I would use the batting type insulation. If the batting gets wet and / or freezes you may lose more heat than you retain and it will turn to mush.

[Mklangelo]

dont think I would use the batting type insulation. If the batting gets wet and / or freezes you may lose more heat than you retain and it will turn to mush.

What it is is R-27 insulation, about 1/8" thick sandwiched between two layers of a heavy duty foil type substance.  It's not fiberglass batting type stuff. Click below link.

My insulation

[Mklangelo]

I think I now understand what Finsky is talking about.  The insulation that is placed on the inner cover cannot take away the gap between itself and the outer cover.  And there is a natural small gap between the outer sides of the Hive body and the inner sides of the vertical boards of the inner cover. 

With the insulation I'm using, I'll just have to trim away about 1/2" of the top of the insulation I have wrapped around the outside of the hive because right now, it's blocking that little gap and stopping the airflow.  But the insulation I'm using is thin enough not to interfere with the gap between the inner and outer covers.  Whew...

Much harder to explain than to show... lol

[Michael Bush]

The only thing I've ever insulated is the tops.  I did wrap once with 15# tarpaper.  The hives were soaked in water from condensation all winter and I was not impressed.

If I do anything, I just put a piece of styrofoam on the lid under the brick.

[Mklangelo]

The only thing I've ever insulated is the tops.  I did wrap once with 15# tarpaper.  The hives were soaked in water from condensation all winter and I was not impressed.

If I do anything, I just put a piece of styrofoam on the lid under the brick.

Do you think is was a ventilation problem?  I'm wondering how the tarpaper would cause water to condense inside the hive. I'm using that thin, foil covered foam stuff.

[Michael Bush]

>Do you think is was a ventilation problem?

They were all top entrances with SBB with a plastic tray in.  There is some draft around the edge of the tray.  It was the wood of the hive between the tar paper and the hive that was soaked.

> I'm wondering how the tarpaper would cause water to condense inside the hive.

Not inside.  Outside.  Between the tar paper and the hive.  The wood of the hive was drenched all winter.

>I'm using that thin, foil covered foam stuff.

That's good insulation.  Maybe just put it on the North or West side and leave the South side to get some sun.

[Finsky]

You live in warm climate. You have strange opinions about insulation. Those will not work here at all.
But note that heat comes from bees, not from sun.
If you have uninsulated front wall heat escapes via it at night

[Mklangelo]

You live in warm climate. You have strange opinions about insulation. Those will not work here at all.
But note that heat comes from bees, not from sun.
If you have uninsulated front wall heat escapes via it at night

For your information Finsky, Wisconsin is not a warm climate, it is a temperate climate which means we have warm summers and cold winters, it is not uncommon to reach -30 F.  So please don't tell me I live in a warm climate.
Did you ever hear of heat radiation from sunlight transfering heat through a surface?  Your quite fond of telling people that they don't know anything or that they have "hobby imagination" whatever the hell that means.  A little too fond of it I'm afraid. 

Here is a quick lesson:

If a surface absorbs sunlight energy, where does it go?  Does it go out?  No it has been absorbed.  Darker colors do this more than lighter ones for example.


If a surface reflects sunlight energy, where does that energy go?  It goes out, reflected off the surface. 
  such as in the insulation I will be using, it is foil covered foam.  So when I ask about the reflection of heat, I don't find that question or concern to be "weird" at all, in fact it is quite logical.
It's really very simple.

PS:  The insulation I'm using reflects 97% of radiant heat.  It's good stuff.  Better than a pillow or whatever you were using...lol

[Mklangelo]

>Do you think is was a ventilation problem?

They were all top entrances with SBB with a plastic tray in.  There is some draft around the edge of the tray.  It was the wood of the hive between the tar paper and the hive that was soaked.

> I'm wondering how the tarpaper would cause water to condense inside the hive.

Not inside.  Outside.  Between the tar paper and the hive.  The wood of the hive was drenched all winter.

>I'm using that thin, foil covered foam stuff.

That's good insulation.  Maybe just put it on the North or West side and leave the South side to get some sun.

I just might do that.

[Michael Bush]

I have not done it but once with the felt, but many Canadian beekeepers and Northern NY, Vermont and Maine beekeepers seem pretty sold on the heat gain from the black paper on a warm day allowing them to rearrange stores.

[Mklangelo]

Yea, that makes sense.  I like this insulation but it's shinyness bothers me.  But my hives are white so I'm not sure how much radiant heat they would absorb to begin with.

[Finsky]

Thanks anqelo. When you speak about insulation,you need not care about radiation. And those pilows over inner cover . It means that you may use there many kind material . However you seems know already all :-D

[Paraplegic Racehorse]

I was unable to see in your photo link of your insulation but, is it shiny on both sides or only on one? If shiny on only one side, you might try wrapping with foil side IN (reflect heat back into hive) rather than out.