The Flow Hive now BIGGER and BETTER than before, Assembly Guide 10 Frame! Honey Bee Hive

okay so today I have the new larger flow hive and a lot of the components have been improved and I'm going to share it with you you may have watched my videos that are released back in February 17th of 2016 and there I showed only a flow super this is going to be the entire flow hive and it's larger than the old one the reason I bought the old flow super is because I wanted seven frames to match up with my 10 frame Langstroth hive bodies and I'm showing you the bottom board that comes with this I already pulled out the plastic corrugated piece and this allows you to open up the bottom and ventilate the whole hive and even things like varroa mites may fall right through and get out this is a queen excluder and you're going to see why I want you to use that Queen excluder on your flow hive just going over the components here this material is actually a hoop pine wood material that comes from Australia so we're going to start off with the breed box which is the bottom box of any hive and you notice that the trim around these finger joints looks black and that's because all these components now our laser cut so the fit is fantastic and the material is nice and heavy by the way when you see these shim strips you know that that is for the top box that will actually hold the flow frames and when you're putting it together you might want to use a soft mallet like this just to top the joints up nice and tight you'll also notice that the holes are pre-drilled and the screws that are provided should go in those pre-drilled holes don't start running screws everywhere else and I'll tell you why in a minute I always test fit everything before you start putting your screws in I also recommend you not glue it and here I take my 90 degree triangle and make sure that everything is nice and square before you start running the screws in also clamp it up and draw in those corners nice and tight so make sure it's square titin they give you a brood box screw kit be very careful with these crews because they don't give you any extras also be very careful not to over-tighten these just snug it up and leave it right there this material has a really nice finish to it I am actually very impressed by it now here's the brood box all put together of course the handles are on the outside and on the upper portion next they also include all the components for wooden frames now if you've been watching any of my other videos you know the title generally use wooden frames for my honey bee comb but since they're here I'm just going to go over how to put them together always dried test fit everything and if you're putting frames together that are made of wood I like to use guerilla glue here I'm going to just clamp them up and let them dry they also include enough pins for you to nail all of these components together so if you want to go ahead and use the pin sometimes people have problems with the pin splitting this thin would square them up to you just like you do with the boxes make sure you get your triangle out and make sure those angles are 90 degrees now you see this little piece of wooden trim if you're putting foundation in these you don't use that and there's also the holes here to run wires through if you're putting in foundation when you put the trim in if you're going to use it the way I do when I use wooden frames is I put a little bit of glue on that and stick those in there then I just take beeswax and I run it along this edge and that way it encourages the bees to start to draw out their comb always square things up first they just happen the Brad's if you want to like I said these are included and I'm just happy one together here to show you where I would put it and here's the thing notice that's 10 frames so before you couldn't get the full flow hive with 10 frames that would match up with a Langstroth 10 frame box so here it is it's bigger and it's better and I put in the acorn frames which have just come out and you can get those with double wax dip triple wax dip and the bees really go after those so the next thing we're going to do is we're going to put together that flow super you get the plastic window that allows you to observe the frames on the side and it comes with this tape on it if you can pull that off in one piece good for you the shortest screws that come in your kit go for that window and you put that together the other thing that I was happy with is that window cover that comes up is thicker than the one that originally came out and again square everything up before you start using screws and I also put these quick rip clamps on there leave gaps on the side remember this piece with the two holes in it has to be easily removed they recommend shimming that with a credit card or something while you put this together and that way you'll make sure and have the space necessary there are two screws that are countersunk here and you'll see that beveled head on them and it also matches the countersunk part of this metal strapping that holds the position of this box again very careful not to over tighten now this is all pretty much the same as the original box that came out so when people refer to a flow super they are talking about just his top box now also these little knobs when they first came out were just they were a little smaller to begin with and it was just drilled out would some people have problems with that stripping out well now we have machine screws and there is a little metal piece in there to receive the threads so now it's nice and tight and you won't have to glue it up the way I did with my old ones last thing you want to have it with these knobs to pull out and so with this new box they did a great job improving both the size and the way that they're threaded in glue them if you want but I think it's fine the way it is and again test fit just to make sure everything looks really good and fits good later on we're going to have expansion and contraction as it's exposed to the weather now this cover access plate for that side viewing window is thicker than ever I notice that the ones that I've had out in the apiary for a year more are already working a little bit and they were a thin material so this is much better and of course you have the spring here that prevents you from tightening too much screwing in and I might slightly over tighten this one but remember that these have to move to allow you to remove this viewing window cover but I like the material I like everything I've seen so far and then of course you have your retainer that keeps both the top access pull in place and keeps your honey flow frame access panel in place unless you want to pull it out to get your flow frame that very tight clearance there between that and the knobs but it's workable I could probably shave that down a little bit now keep in mind this hoop pine you are going to want to put a finish on the exterior of it I know it looks looks nice right now I even put Thompson's WaterSeal on it but you can paint it use any exterior finish do not paint or seal or finish the interior of your hives so now we're going to go onto the roof again they have a screw kit just for the route components you're going to want to put together the front part of the roof and the back part and the side panels first and make sure the top edges of those where you have that roof angle make sure that they match up nice before you move on I also don't recommend screwing the screws in super tight leave yourself some play and you want to make sure and square this up really good before you go and put these shingle pieces on and you'll notice that angle at the top where the cut changes that's where you line up the leading edge of each shingle piece now I decided once I squared it up to go ahead and clamp this down to the table just to make sure it doesn't shift while I'm screwing these shingle pieces on you can pre-drill I did not eat shingle piece has two screw holes already drilled in it so if you pre-drill it would be going into those end pieces and no problems which is running the screw straight in now that they're all on the last piece that we're going to put in is going to be the top piece the ridge piece of the roof now when you're done with all of this you're definitely going to want to flip it over and you're going to want to seal all those joints from the inside with our TV or maybe you could use some silicone or even just all-weather glue but you want to make sure all those joints are weather sealed so now let's put it all together so here we are again with the baseboard now this bottom board for the flow hives when it sits flat is actually built to tilt your hive backwards so it's already ready to go and again that corrugated plastic sheet has two different level settings so you can snug it up to the top when you're extracting honey or you can put it down to the bottom setting which allows it to catch debris from inside the hive but also offers more ventilation probably peak summer when it's really hot you want to just pull that corrugated plastic out and let them ventilate the hive right through the bottom so now everything you're looking at is standard there's nothing different here than any other beehive it's not unique when it comes to the differences in beehives between a flow hive and a traditional 10 frame Langstroth hive it's just a flow super that makes the difference so when you're starting out you are only going to use this braid box the bottom board the inner cover and the top cover then once your beads are built up that's when you see all the comb you see the brood and you see the resources being stored now we add the flow super so the first thing that goes in is that Queen excluder especially if you only have the brood box and you're going straight into the flow super you don't want those bees to be able to get up in the top and have the Queen follow them and lay eggs in these flow frames and I do have another video that shows that the Queen can and will lay her eggs and develop brood inside these flow frames so you want to make sure and prevent that now we're just going to put them all together here and again look at the size of it these are seven flow frames which matches up with all of your ten frame Langstroth box so that's why I now have the full flow hive before I didn't have the full hive because I wanted it to match my 10 frame gear I have a lot of 10 frame legs throughout the equipment now you notice there's a lot of play in this you want to make sure that they will all come forward and stay tight and look at the right edge there keep them centered so that the bees can actually come through the sides and I have other videos showing that and the bees will seal everything up on their own notice when I put the drain tube in that the piece shoved backwards so what do we do about these loose pieces in this flow super well I'm going to show you there's an adjustment screw here on the back and we're going to back out that screw so that it pushes the flow frame forward all the flow frames need to be forward which is the back of the box and here's how much I push the screw out and it's going to take all the play out and I did this to every one of these frames so now they're nice and tight when you got to push it in there there is a little sponginess to it all of that movement and going to go away when the bees go through and seal up all of these joints we have to show a close up here of course the access point for the actuator and when you put that in it opens these flow frames I'm going to show you that in a second and again you know that little piece will not go back in place until you have put all of your flow frames in a closed position so it's pretty foolproof now I want to show you up close and look at the side of this flow frame a lot of questions come to me regarding how the bees must be guillotined inside these flow frames and how when you activate it if they go in and they must be killed when you activate it I can tell you having used these for over a year I have not had one bee casualty on these flow frames and I just want you to see all the space that's in here so even if the bees start to work these cells while you're draining the honey and if they're working the cells or Heather heads in there while you're moving it back into this closed position there's lots of room for them to back out they do not get smashed they do not get cut up the surfaces are very irregular your movements are slow and the bees have plenty of space to move out without losing their appendages or being killed by the flow frame actuation now if you want to see how this has worked out I have lots of videos also on YouTube that show first and second extractions of these your bees are going to take several weeks sometimes just to seal up these joints before they start to put honey in them you may not get any honey from your flow frames in your first season if you're in the northern United States so here's the whole unit put together of course again I'm very happy with this because it accepts all of my 10 frame equipment now this is just a brief box on the bottom notice that it's already tilted back you want to make sure and level your highs carefully as far as tipping side-to-side because when they build their comb they're going to build it straight down from gravity but tilting forward and backwards does not affect how well they align their comb make sure that you're getting original flow I've equipment though there are lots of copycats out there this is the box they included another flow hat with a veil and I have to say I just love the way this thing is put together I hope this assembly video has helped you out and I hope that I've answered your questions of course if you have more questions feel free to comment of course we can't close out without first showing some honey dripping out of a flow hive thank you for watching and I hope you continue to learn and enjoy managing your honeybees

Channel: Frederick Dunn

Views: 287,140

Rating: 4.901885 out of 5

Keywords: Flow Hive, review, new, larger, cold weather, for winter, honey, beekeeping, survival, North America, Winter Care, 10 frame, Langstroth, compatible, setup, assembly, demonstration, wood, fit, finish, beekeeper, keeping bees, housing, box, quality review, honey flow, tap comb, tools, square, woodworking

Id: nsu52qMlDaA

Length: 16min 23sec (983 seconds)

Published: Sat May 27 2017