Solar wax melters.

[mainelybees]

Here's a question for all of you. I looked at several different plans when building my solar wax melters. Most plans had subtle differences and I just picked all the designs I liked from them and built four of them. However one thing that was the same with all of them was the interior paint color, white. I can understand why you would paint the outside black, but why not paint the inside a dark color as well, wouldn't you get more heat if the inside were dark? I went with white for fear that the bee police would find me, but has anyone risked it all and painted their wax melter interior a dark color?
David

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Maine-ly Bees
David Wallace and Family
Bowdoinham, ME
mainelybees@farmbid.com

[Clayton]

Hi,

wouldn't you get more heat if the inside were dark? I went with white for fear that the bee police would find me, but has anyone risked it all and painted their wax melter interior a dark color?

reply:

Yes. By all means go ahead. This shouldn't effect the wax. Don't paint the pan/tray the wax is in however.

Clay

[Bobbee]

I think the reason for white paint on the inside is this. The wax will be darker than white and thus will absorb more radiation. I do think a dark pan to melt wax in would be good.
What angle do you keep the glass at?


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BobBee

[jlk]

I just finished building a new solar wax melter,and painted the whole thing black inside and out.It has been working perfectly for about two weeks now.I have only put a small amount of wax through it,some old combs left over from last summer.I also read to paint the inside white,but for ease of painting I stuck with one color...JOHN

[ckinser]

ok just for giggles i will theorize on the black and white thing. Painting you collector black will make the collector absorb more light and heat up. Painting the collector white on the inside will bounce the light around inside the collector which means more light will be absorbed by the wax so the wax will heat up faster than the collector itself. fact is both work either way. Ps mine is painted black but i might change it this year to see if i notice a great difference.

[Paul B]

Here's a possible improvement that I've been thinking about. I have looked at a couple of different wax melter plans also, and found them to be fairly similar. I'd paint the inside black but would add one small feature. When building the area for the pans, I'd add a fine screen above the pans and place the cappings/broken combs on top of the screen so that they will melt and filter through the screen before making a block of clean wax in the pans. For small amounts of wax, you could simply slide the pans inside the leg of a pair of ladies nylons and have clean wax in one process. Has anyone else out there tried this??
Paul

[jlk]

Thanks Paul for the stocking around the pan idea.I have been trying to think of a simple way to filter the wax as it melts,all in one step.I will try that this spring on the "bread pans" collecting the wax in my melter...JOHN

[cider]

I have a large double glass patio door I am planning on making a larger wax melter with sometime hopefully soon.Anyone have plans for something this size or made one this size? Cider

[BILLY BOB]

A double glass doors or windows are insulators. The inside will not get as hot as a single pain of glass. It may still work though. Wax doesn't need to be super heated to melt.

[odfrank]

I have an identical white one and black one, and the white one seems to work better.

[Eich]

I saw the wax melter in Beesource are there any other? Is that the one recommended? I don't have any wax to melt yet but would like to build one over the winter. Darrell