Wax rendering

[bevy's honeybees]

I've tried different ways of filtering, like a strainer lined with cheescloth and spooning melted wax through it several times but I still cannot get my wax as clean as it needs to be. Cheesecloth is not cheap and I do try to conserve. Also have melted and cooled, dumping out dirty water under hardened wax and doing that several times. Still not clean enough, what am I doing wrong? Not all my wax is capping wax, some is comb wax. Is that the problem? Thanks

[beedeetee]

Thread bare tee shirt in a solar melter. Very clean wax.

[jrbbees]

Bevy, consider making your solar wax melter so that as the wax melts it must run down a longer flat sheet that exposes it to the sun for longer. the UV rays will help bleach your wax and make it much whiter. You can run the same wax through several times.

Do this after the T shirt. Cheesecloth is to catch large curds not very fine dust and body parts. You will have the T shirt retain more wax but it will be cleaner. Two layers of cloth is better than one.

[Ravenseye]

The t-shirt filter is a good one. I dump all my comb into a solar wax melter. At the end of the pan is a bread pan and I rubber band a paper towel around the top of it to act as an initial filter. When I decide to use the wax "loaf" I melt it again and pour the hot wax through an old t-shirt. That wax is as filtered as I ever need it to be!

[Ben Brewcat]

Tshirt, coffee filter, sweatshirt...

[forgeblast]

what about a black piece of aluminum screening as a pre filter before the cheesecloth or shirt?

[Ravenseye]

I folded a couple strips of #8 hardware cloth and put them across the pan of the wax melter. They catch the big chunks of comb as the wax is melting out.

[bevy's honeybees]

what about a black piece of aluminum screening as a pre filter before the cheesecloth or shirt?

Thanks for all the good advice. I don't have a solar waxmelter and it will be awhile before I invest in making or buying one. I went to a beekeeping teaching day where the woman who did the wax rendering station said she uses a crockpot with water on the bottom, then strains. I got a thrift store crockpot and I like how that works, but still wasn't able to get properly clean. I have a wire hand held strainer to get the big stuff which I added the cheesecloth after large hunks out. Now will use the t-shirt after I clean it out with strainer. Gunk comes out easy if I rap it on newspaper while it's still melted. I also got another used crockpot and I will have second pot heated and ready with t-shirt piece over the top, water too, to keep wax melted so it will keep running through the material. From now on, cappings only.
Thanks everyone!

[broodhead]

For extra pure wax I use the large commercial paper coffee filters that are available through restaurant supply houses. These are the big ones, and I render my final stage through the filter . These filters are made of thin paper and do an excellent job, although I do not use these filters as my first filtering stage. My first stage is through cheesecloth after it is skimmed . These coffee filters work well in the solar melter as well.

[Bee Goddess]

new, clean pantyhose.... knee highs, works perfect.
I also use them for straining honey.

[Rolando]

I use an ice chest with the lid off and a piece of glass I got from a coffee table as the lid. Inside I have a big pot of water. I put the wax in a big colander lined with a paper towel. The wax filled colander rests over the pot of water. Results are a very clean wax that is bright yellow. The wax drips into the water. Any heavier debris not filtered will fall to the bottom and the wax floats. When it cools the wax makes a frisbee sized disc of wax that is easy to pick off the top of the water (doesn't stick to bottom cause it floats).