I dipped my first hive bodies yesterday using the 'standard' 75% paraffin / 25% gum rosin recipe from Mann-Lake.
The gum rosin caued lots of gobs to stick on the surface and turned the mixture a deeper brown than I would have liked, so I would like to use as little as possible. So for those who have experence with wax-dipping hives, my questions are:
1/ Is gum-rosin really needed? What happens if you dip in 100% paraffin?
2/ from 0% to 25% is a large range - what is the minimum % of gum rosin needed to get the most important benefits?
3/ When I see how much of my gum rosin ended up concentrated in lumps on the wood, and I also see how well protected and hard (not sticky) the diiped wood that is not covered with gobs of resin cam out, I believe that cutting the amount of resin down to 5-10% should work about as well - has anyone tried less rosin in the 5-10% range?
-fafrd
The gum rosin caued lots of gobs to stick on the surface and turned the mixture a deeper brown than I would have liked, so I would like to use as little as possible. So for those who have experence with wax-dipping hives, my questions are:
1/ Is gum-rosin really needed? What happens if you dip in 100% paraffin?
2/ from 0% to 25% is a large range - what is the minimum % of gum rosin needed to get the most important benefits?
3/ When I see how much of my gum rosin ended up concentrated in lumps on the wood, and I also see how well protected and hard (not sticky) the diiped wood that is not covered with gobs of resin cam out, I believe that cutting the amount of resin down to 5-10% should work about as well - has anyone tried less rosin in the 5-10% range?
-fafrd