I went the other way. I'm a small operation but I bought a Thorne wax dipper. It's an awesome machine, paid $3700.00 for it.
It has limitations though. I have a lot of Layens hives that are 2" thick (Or whatever they call 2 inches these days). They will not fit it the dipping rack.
Thorne said they would have to re-design a dipping rack and the rack would be expensive so they hadn't considered doing it.
I may look into having one built since I have so many Layens 20 frames and 10 frames.
If you try to go on the cheap just be very aware that you are dealing with an open flame and hot wax. I was very nervous when I ran mine the first time. Because it is a quality piece of equipment it was a non issue.
Make sure you get some good gloves as well!!!!!!! (The wax temp is higher than what water boils at!!!!! You will get severely burned if you stick your finger in it!!!!!)
It does a great job.
Lastly; I ended up buying a bunch of colored hard plastic discs to attach to the hive boxes because they all look the same now!!!!
