Thick Comb Blocks Ventilation?

[Aisha]

I installed a slatted rack and I still have baseball-size bearding under my sbb all day.

The used honeycombs that I bought were very thick and well-used. I can only get 7 of them into an 8 frame super. I think some of it was Duragilt and it has some funky, double wide comb in places too.

Does this thick, deep comb, block ventilation and cause bearding?

THANKS!

[Aisha]

Full Disclosure:

I have an open sbb, a propped telescoping lid and an inner cover with vent hole in the middle.

[Michael Bush]

The heat is causing the bearding.

[Oldbee]

"I think some of it was Duragilt and it has some "funky", double wide comb in places too. I had that experience with "Duragilt" also; it was more than a year old though. Maybe "Duragilt works best with new swarms or package bees well fed with sugar syrup. I hope you will be able to gradually replace those "funky" frames.

[Aisha]

The heat is causing the bearding.

Yeah. It's in full sun until 3 pm and I think I'll have to give it more shade.

I put a screen on top instead of my inner cover. I put my queen excluder on top of the screen to hold it down and beetle-proof it. I propped the telescoping top 3" and put one of those indoor/outdoor thermometer sensors in the hive today.

I did various experiments to reduce the internal upper super temperature (97.1 *F at it's height today).

One thing that worked really well was putting my car's mylar windshield solar shade on the south facing side of the hive with some air flow space. Reduced the temperture 2* F.

Propping the top cover 3" as opposed to 2" made a .5 *F cooler temp. difference.

Those Radioshack digital thermometers on a wire are the bomb.