"Warre yet?" ... "A bit I suppose"

A wonderful wealth of wood wombling* for the weekend.

I have to admit it..."I am a wood wombler*!"
I find it very difficult to throw away pieces of wood that even Isambard Kingdom Brunel would struggle to find some structural application for. This does lead to a very messy/crowded shed. Sometimes it is a matter of open the door, throwing something in, and then closing the door quickly before you action triggers something equal and opposite.

However, one of my favourite pass-times is to stroll (clamber) in and look around see if there is anything I fancy cobbling together. For me being able to find a piece of wood that is exactly the right size for what I want out of this pile of.. well let's be honest.. rubbish is great.

This weekend I took apart a discarded pallet and made a kTBH and... believe it or not... A WARRE HIVE FLOOR! Yes, you heard it, some actually progress towards the project I have outstanding for a while.

I stripped the pallet to pieces (mostly). Clamped three pallet strips (300mm, 12") and then screwed on holding strips to make the sides. The strips help support and straighten the wood. By clamping together first it helped reduce gapping which is always a issue with wood wombling. There wasn't enough good wood to make the ends the way I usually would so I again clamped some pieces together and cut a follower board shape.

          

I then fixed the sides onto one end, and placed 15 top bars (not wombled) and a spacer strip in place to set where the other end would be fixed.

The remaining half piece of pallet (having removed most of the slats) I laid some aluminium modeling mesh onto and screwed on a frame. This is a double Warre hive stand.. woo hooo! All I need to do now it make the hive to go on it.

The ends were left with a small "lip" at the bottom onto which I decided to add feet. I had a thin strip of mesh as an off-cut from the mesh I used in the warre base so decided to do a mesh floor. The feet then acted as handy runners to allow a board to slide underneath (this board is the first piece of wood to be used not from the pallet).

      

Gaps are another given when it comes to wood wombling. To fill any large spaces which could act as additional entrances (or more to the point exits) I mix some shellac sanding sealer, wood glue, and saw dust to make a putty and shove it in.

Enter pallet number 2. Just a few pieces from this to make the roof frame. I have made it deep enough to take a piece of insulation board. Topped with feather-edge fence board offcuts.

      

The outside is finished using raw linseed oil and the inside is painted with a shellac. The finish on the inside is probably not necessary BUT it was just in case the wood had been treated this protects the bees. Most pallets will be marked indicating any treatments (such as bark removal, and heat treatment) so look up the number on the internet before use. Once the coatings had dried I gave the inside a good rub over with beeswax to make it smell homey. The remains of the second pallet became a stand, this is just finished with some spare cuprinol.

              

Here is a little addition which for the sake of needing a name I will call a "teacher board". It is based on concepts I have followed on some top bar forums.

Basically it is the top part of a follower board. Since this is large bait hive the bees entering it will have to build all the comb. As we all know if they start even a little wonky it can start a wave propagating throughout the hive. This teacher board will be placed one bar in from the front (2nd bar) and will aid in bees starting the 1st and 3rd comb straight. Once started you move it along to the 5th bar (swapping the 5th bar into the gap) where it helps the 4th and 6th bar to start straight. Then onto the 8th, 11th, 14th. they may well build down of off the bottom but that's fine. The holes allow bees to more easily traverse the "comb". I may add more smaller ones.

The entrances are standard drilled holes. One at 1", the other at 3/4" but with the outside at 1" so I can use the same cork size to block the hole. A small piece of ply was added as a landing board.

Since I only have two top bars hive currently made this one may well have to hold a colony for a while so I will be using a few of these:

http://augustcottageapiary.wordpress.com/2014/04/03/finished-your-warre-now-erm-still-not-so-much/At the back end of the hive in case I need to super it during a strong nectar flow.

There we have it a wonderfully warm welcoming wombled wooden weatherproof wonder waiting for willing ....eh... damn .. I also wish it was for wasps!

*"The wombles" was a 1970's TV show in the UK about some tiny creatures who would collect rubbish and make things out of it.

o/~ making good use of the things that we find, things that eveyday folks leave behind o/~