First of all, I wouldn't do this (cut down split) unless I had empty honey supers of drawn comb available and the hives I was doing it to were very strong to start with. But I have done it, about a week before the main flow starts, take the queen and all the unsealed brood, and a few frames of food, and make another hive and move it to another location in the same yard. Leave one frame of eggs with the original hive for them to make a new queen. The new hive you made will lose most all the foragers back to the original hive. The original hive will have nothing but one frame of eggs, the rest sealed brood, and all the foragers. It'll be about 3 weeks, maybe a bit more, before you have a laying queen in the original hive. Put on a couple supers of drawn comb to start with, and you may need more if the flow is real good, they will store lots of honey to be sure with no brood to take care of.