Home made Bee Vacuum pictures

[davemacdon]

After replying to a recent thread, I am now making my home-made bee vacuum pictures available for you all to see.

My Album

It is a altered idea from one I managed to download from the net. Works well, but obviously needs 240 volt power close enough to use.

The main collection body is a water dispenser bottle, the bottom cut off, a tube inserted and covered with a sieve head. Bungee straps, hot melt glue and cable ties hold it all together.

You are able to see the bees inside when in use and after collection. Retaining the original lid allows you to prevent their escape or release until you have them where you need them.

Any constructive questions / comments welcomed.

I have the original pdf idea should anyone want it - please pm me.

Dave.

 

[coffin dodger]

Works well, but obviously needs 240 volt power close enough to use.

Any constructive questions / comments welcomed.


Dave.

Brilliant, I love it and the fact that it's made from bits and pieces that you had around, your a man after my own heart

As a very loose sugestion, would it work with one of the larger 12 volt car vacuum cleaners, one of those and a car battery would make it very portable.

Regards
Ray

 

[davemacdon]

Yes, The original pdf that I downloaded used a dust buster glued into the base, however I don't have one and my experience suggests that without using it regularly, it would end up with no charge in it when needed and an old hoover kicking about meant that this idea became the final outcome. Having said that, without this I would just resort to previous swarm collection methods.

Or I could use my camping inverter on a 12 volt battery to power this???

Thanks for your comments.

Dave.

 

[rockdoc]

How about using one of those two way manual pumps sold for pumping up rubber dinghy's and the like. They appear in Al*i et al on a regular basis for around £6. They are very strong and I'm sure with practice you could adjust the suction action. That would make the ultimate portable!

 

[davemacdon]

Might work, but would need one person to operate pump and one to operate nozzle. When collecting swarms am generally the only one with a bee suit and therefore effectively alone doing it!

 

[coffin dodger]

could use my camping inverter on a 12 volt battery to power this???

Dave.

Hi Dave,

Yes an invertor could do the job, it depends on the output from the invertor and the power draw for the vac, say a 1.2kw invertor will run a vac rated at 800w but not the other way round.

I was thinking more on the lines of running a 12v vac from the battery in your car/van/transport, if the engines running it keeps the battery topped up while your hoovering up the bees, this is of course dependant on you being able to get the vehicle close enough or having a reasonable length of two core wire handy.

Regards
Ray

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

We had a lecture in the Welsh convention this year titled 'if Heath Robinson was a beekeeper......' ashamed to say I can't recall the gent's name but his bee vac consisited of a nuc sized box with a side vent which held a 12 volt motorbike battery and a car heater fan unit - he then clipped a nuc with a mesh floor on top of this - the roof of the nuc (again clipped on) consisted of a length of tumble drier vent hose which was then connected to a one inch waste pipe so you just switched the fan on, pointed the pipe and sucked the bees in. You could connect extra pipe on to the assembly to collect high swarms in trees - I think his highest collection was over 30 feet. he had installed a rheostat to the fan so he could regulate the speed to give more or less suck in relation to the length of pipe.
The size of two nucs with an independent power supply the whole thing was totally portable - ingenious!

 

[Outlander]

Dave I have all so seen those water bottles used with bottom cut out and the other end attached to a long poll. There’s a video on YouTube where the bottle is offered up to a swarm high in a tree, bottle surrounds swarm and with a sharp jolt forward swarms drops into bottle and the guy doing this with great control lets poll slip through his hands then emptied the swarm into a travel box. It appeared to all happen so fast that not many bees at all got into the air. The bottle that was used for this appeared to be slightly bigger without the handle.

It just amazed me how swift and quickly and easy it appeared to be.

 

[Nic Rhodes]

Could you use one of these if you were not into DIY:?

http://www.triton.net.au/Product/330055

 

[Shabro]

We had a lecture in the Welsh convention this year titled 'if Heath Robinson was a beekeeper......' ashamed to say I can't recall the gent's name but his bee vac consisited of a nuc sized box with a side vent which held a 12 volt motorbike battery and a car heater fan unit - he then clipped a nuc with a mesh floor on top of this - the roof of the nuc (again clipped on) consisted of a length of tumble drier vent hose which was then connected to a one inch waste pipe so you just switched the fan on, pointed the pipe and sucked the bees in. You could connect extra pipe on to the assembly to collect high swarms in trees - I think his highest collection was over 30 feet. he had installed a rheostat to the fan so he could regulate the speed to give more or less suck in relation to the length of pipe.
The size of two nucs with an independent power supply the whole thing was totally portable - ingenious!

I think that would be Graham Royle, a really nice helpful chap too!

 

[For want of a better word]

Have you tried it out yet?

 

[Skyhook]

Like it, nice and simple. 2 thoughts-

1) I can't tell if the suction pipe is against the sieve. If so, I would shorten it, and maybe put a baffle plate in front, to diffuse the suction so the bees aren't slammed against the mesh.

2) Next time you're at the council tip, see if you can find another vacuum hose to go before the bottle. Could make it a lot easier getting into nooks and crannies!

Happy hoovering!

.

 

[Nic Rhodes]

Bees would go into one of the two connection on the side which discharge into the large vessel. The vacumm is pulled from the centre connection through the coarse filter. Never used a bee vacuum personally due to lack of power at my apiaries.

 

[oliver90owner]

Never used a bee vacuum personally due to lack of power at my apiaries.

To be honest, I would have thought that is the last place anyone would want to use one! Please enlighten me to the benefits of it's use in an apiary!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Never used a bee vacuum personally due to lack of power at my apiaries.

To be honest, I would have thought that is the last place anyone would want to use one! Please enlighten me to the benefits of it's use in an apiary!

Instead of using clearer boards you could just use you bee vac and hoover the supers clean sort of opposite to commercials with their blowers - you could then hust put them in boxes with a queen each and there you go - ready made package Simples!