Cleaning Pierco

[Hutch]

Can anyone give me some ideas on cleaning Pierco plastic foundation. I have a couple hundred sheets that I have cleaned old comb from. I scrape the old stuff off and have tried a power washer on it, have tried a wire brush and several others things. They just won't come clean.The best system I have come up with is to let the sheets soak in water and then use a power washer on them. This gets most of the stuff from the cells but you have to soak it a long time. Any help would bee appreciated.

[Todd Zeiner]

Try soaking them in hot soapy water before the power washer. Sometimes that old wax can be tuff. I have a hot water garden hose tap in my garage. I just fill a plastic walmart tub with saop & hot water and scrub with a stiff brush. My wax is not very old though. The power washer should do it.

[Sundance]

If memory serves me they can take water up to 180F.

Check with manufacturer first though. If it is then that would make short work of it.

[King bee apiary]

I built my solor wax melter for just this reason.It will hold about 20 frames,this way I can recycle the wax every few years.
It should melt all the wax of after a few days,I have tried 1 frame already just to see if it works..And so far it does but the wax was only a year old..
Good luck

[Ishi]

My solor wax melter melts them in the summer

Red Bluff CA

[nursebee]

The problem I noted was residual hard stuff in the bottom of the cell. Cheap pressure washer cleaned some of this off but the work was hard, long, and wet. I have not tried it with a better washer but expect that it would do a better job. I got frustrated enought to just sell the foundation.

The solar wax melter handled the wax but not the gunk in the bottom. I did not try to put this back in the hive, so that would be a good next step.

[TwT]

I have emailed pierco before and they responded In a day or 2, email them and see what they recommend. here's there link,,,,

http://www.pierco.net/contactus.htm

[Michael Bush]

Scrape them off and let the bees clean them.

[MountainCamp]

I leave the used pierco frames in a hive box and let the wax months have at them.
They do a pretty good job of cleaning the old comb and cocoons off.
What is left comes right off.
Then I re-wax the frame.

[Hutch]

Thanks for the help. I have tried scraping and then putting them back in hoping the bees would clean them out but with the lack of wax on the sheets, they did not accept them to good. I have applied wax back on the sheets and covered the gunk in the bottom of the cells and it worked ok but would still like a better way of cleaning them. I like the wax moth method of cleaning them and will give it a try. Thanks to all.

[rainesridgefarm]

get some hi alk chlorinated pipeline cleaner and let it soak in that before you power wash it. I have noticed that it will even desolve the propolis. I have used it to clean my extractor and it takes everything off. I do not know if it is the sodium hydroxide or the clorine that does it but it is one of them. be careful it does burn the skin if you get it one you.

[Dick Allen]

Solar wax melters?? If you guys are having good luck using them, my hat is off to you. I put a couple of Pierco frames into mine a few years back. It melted the wax ok, but it also buckled and warped the frame beyond use.

[SilverFox]

Rainesridgefarm: :eek: You use colrine to clean your stainless steel :eek:
Was told never to use clorine as it leaches the nickle from the stainless steel and will cause rust. This is from a friend that works with nothing but stainless steel.

[Ian]

good to know,

Tap water okay, Thats from a treatment plant?

[ April 16, 2006, 05:28 PM: Message edited by: Ian ]

[dcross]

<<Was told never to use clorine as it leaches the nickle from the stainless steel and will cause rust. This is from a friend that works with nothing but stainless steel.>>

I get paid to put chlorine on hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stainless. Sometimes twice a week.

[TwT]

I know never use Bleach on stainless, it will eat it up before long... never heard that about chlorine...

[SilverFox]

Just passing along what a friend told me, he works fabricating stainless steel tanks for a dairy and has been doing it for over 20yrs. Maybe I'm wrong, I use my pressure washer (1650psi) and baking soda.

[amymcg]

Bleach IS chlorine.

[Troy]

Yeah, Bleach is Chlorine, that is why it is sometimes called Chlorine Bleach.

[Dan Williamson]

Just a thought but you might try freezing it and then trying to scrape.

Last winter I had a dead out and was checking some frames and dropped one. The wax was extremely brittle and upon dropping the frame half of the comb popped completely off the plastic foundation.

You could test it on a few. Freeze them and then run your hive tool along the foundation and see how easy (or hard) it comes up.

[isaberg]

With the black frames, anyway, I just put them out in the sun, preferably on a roof. When they're hot, I use a old towel rag gently on them, and the cocoons just roll right off, in sheets. It's pretty nifty! When they're all cocoony like that, the solar melter's never done a thing for me - there's just hardly any wax left.