solar wax extractor - mix of wax and honey

[Helen]

Bought a solar wax extractor, and in the last couple of warmer days, it's done its thing. Melted a whole load of cruddy foundation and scrapings.

However, I've now got a mix of wax and thick honey.

Any tips of separating the 2? Was thinking of making mead with the honey.

 

[Finman]

.
Huh huh!

You surely get another thoughts when you taste that "honey".

 

[enrico]

Wait till it cools and then wash it in cold water. The honey will be on the bottom of the wax. The honey is not worth keeping so just wash it down the drain. Then I remelt on sacking which filters the wax.
E

 

[Helen]

Thx for info. As the wax has melted, it's entombed the 'honey gunge' within it, rather than being separate. Tasted the 'huny gunge' and ok, maybe not mead

Think I need to remelt it all to separate it and then clean. Have got a load of sacking, so will use that for a sieve.

 

[Barbarian]

After washing the wax/honey block, I dry it then wrap in paper kitchen towel. This is returned to the solar. The gunge is caught by the towel. The dry dirty towel is handy as a smoker starter.

 

[enrico]

Yes Helen, it needs leaving longer in the solar extractor to separate. I tilt my tupaware wax receiver to one side so that the honey gathers in the corner. I leave it in the extractor until it has set hard. I then tip the box upside down and press on the bottom. The wax block comes away with the sticky honey now on the top.
Hope this helps
E

 

[pargyle]

Thx for info. As the wax has melted, it's entombed the 'honey gunge' within it, rather than being separate. Tasted the 'huny gunge' and ok, maybe not mead

Think I need to remelt it all to separate it and then clean. Have got a load of sacking, so will use that for a sieve.

The best filter for wax is an old flannelette sheet - cut into circles and place in your seive. You won't waste any wax because the flannellette discs can be boiled up and any residual wax contained in them is released and can be refiltered. Successive filtering through these discs produces a lovely clean wax .. you can tell when it's really clean as there is no staining to the discs.

I've tried a few but by far the best is this one:

http://www.southamptonbeekeepers.co.uk/index_files/notes/wax.pdf

 

[madasafish]

I wash my wax in water and reheat - a block at a time. The block melts and then solidifies with almost all of the remaining honey at the bottom - another washing with cold water does the trick.