Honey Paw Slit Uncapper

[Monsieur Abeille]

Bit rich for a three hive owner at £165 + wallpaperstripper, but has anyone tried the Honey Paw slit uncapper as on the Modern Beekeeping site and here


https://youtu.be/lgRU1nEuWGY

 

[Hivemaker.]

Not used one, but looking at the video it looks to be a slow method.

 

[B+.]

Not used one, but looking at the video it looks to be a slow method.

Its like watching paint dry. 50-300 hives (lets say 5 supers each = 250 - 1500 supers) is probably entry level for that sort of extracting line....in which case the bottleneck is the uncapping. A gravity fed device would probably be much more appropriate (e.g. http://paradisehoney.net/en/project/new-s1b-uncapping-machine/). That little extractor would soon become a bottleneck at the upper end of the range too)

 

[Finman]

.
I like electrict knife. I straighten often the combs when draw then too fat.

But in large scale of video, that seems really manual system. Very slow and day after day that same work.

 

[Plenty of honey]

I like it and the finish it gives shows it being very effective. May be slower, gives better finish (excuse the pun) and saves having to spend time looking at the frames after uncapping before extraction !!

 

[Walrus]

I used my new Honey Paw Slit Uncapper for the first time today, and here is what I found:

- I did 90 frames this afternoon (3 batches of 30).

- I have two bottlenecks: the uncapping and the filtering.

- The videos I saw showed the tool being pulled down the frame from top to bottom. After a while I found that tiring on my hand and switched to pushing it from bottom to top, which was much better

- sometimes the plastic tube containing steam pushed against my hand as I moved along the frame, which is annoying because it's hot

- Once it gets nice and hot it works really well and it's fairly quick. I found it quicker than using the uncapping fork. To date I have only used the fork or the knife and I preferred the slit uncapper.

- It would be hopeless for a commercial operation with loads to get through (too slow and tiring).

- There are no wax cappings to deal with; some wax melts along the slits but nearly all wax stays intact which presumably means the bees have less rebuilding to do when the super goes back to the hive. Also no piles of sticky wax cappings to deal with.

- Overall I'm happy with it because it was faster and less messy than the ways I have uncapped previously

The most frustrating thing for me today was a couple of blow outs in the extractor caused wax to be in the honey, which then clogged the filter and slowed everything right down. Is there a solution to this, assuming blow outs do happen from time to time?

 

[Stiffy]

Looks slow and I can see it having similar ‘ issues’ as using a hot air gun, the remnants of wax re-hardens slowing extraction.
S

 

[thorn]

I have a four frame manual extractor, and had been thinking of buying a larger electric one, but realised that with two of us working, one uncapping with a fork and one spinning, it's the uncapping that's the bottleneck.
This would be quicker.
Is it worth it? Who, apart from the OP, has tried one?
How about the Thorne's heated uncapping tray? Any good?
Is there much wastage with an electric knife? Is an electric carving knife a reasonable option?
Any other recommendations for speeding the uncapping up?

 

[SDM]

Even this type is quicker than that
https://www.googleadservices.com/pa...PDvdGF82RglM_JNK618yTA5yjG2r2zVsaAvE2EALw_wcB

 

[Jambo]

The most frustrating thing for me today was a couple of blow outs in the extractor caused wax to be in the honey, which then clogged the filter and slowed everything right down. Is there a solution to this, assuming blow outs do happen from time to time?

Assuming the filter which is being blocked is a fine one, could you try an initial coarser filtering stage? I am on a small scale and as such my processing set-up is very mickey mouse but the principles are the same - I have a colander and a sieve which sit on top of my proper strainer, the honey flows through the first two essentially unimpeded and they catch the big lumps in case of a blow out or lazy uncapping, leaving the finer strainer relatively clean.

 

[Walrus]

I was just sharing my experience & not making a recommendation. One timesaver (without blowouts in the extractor) is that there’s hardly any wax in the extracted honey so it filters quickly. It’s also good for uneven depths of comb.

There must be reasons why this product is not popular. I think cost is probably the biggest thing putting smaller beekeepers (like me) from trying it, and bigger operations will go for something more substantial/fast. I was intrigued and gave it a try - it’s not a life changer or anything, but I’ll use it again. Not ready to fork out for a commercial uncapper.

 

[Walrus]

Assuming the filter which is being blocked is a fine one, could you try an initial coarser filtering stage? I am on a small scale and as such my processing set-up is very mickey mouse but the principles are the same - I have a colander and a sieve which sit on top of my proper strainer, the honey flows through the first two essentially unimpeded and they catch the big lumps in case of a blow out or lazy uncapping, leaving the finer strainer relatively clean.

Makes sense. I might try just coarse filtering into a tank then warm and fine filter later on. Or I might have several double strainers and swap over when one slows down.

 

[Beefriendly]

You might have been wiser to invest an extra £150 or so in the Abelo steam knife (which comes with steam source). Whilst not perfect it uncaps 2 sides of a super in less time than I can write this. It has speeded things up considerably for me. My new bottle neck is waiting for my 20 frame extractor to finish it's run....need a second extractor now....LOL

On the issues of frames blowing I've found from bitter experience it's better to start slowly and gradually increase speed. I used to blow loads on my old extractor that went from 0 to 60 in a few seconds. Still get an occasional one blows at top speeds but not many.

 

[Angry_Mob]

Any other recommendations for speeding the uncapping up?

Heat gun.

 

[WalnutTreeBees]

Heat gun.

Are you not heating some of the honey and spoiling the taste?

 

[Angry_Mob]

Are you not heating some of the honey and spoiling the taste?

No, the wax pops almost instantly so the honey doesn't get a chance to heat up.