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Thread: price of a home made nuc

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Default price of a home made nuc

    I was given 20 sheets of electoral propaganda correx last week measuring 48" by 32".
    I can make a single 6 frame nuc from a sheet or 4 lids.
    The cost of each is about 3 metres of gaffer tape/duck tape to hold the thing together which is about 28p and two rectangles of 25mm polystyrene which go inside the end bits the frames rest on, probably about 20p worth of polystyrene or you could fish it from a skip if so inclined.
    The polystyrene is optional but I like to push the boat out with regard to extra insulation and quality build!
    So I throw down the gauntlet to you Scots to come up with a cheaper nuc.
    I have one I made 3 years ago which is still going strong.
    I have a template for the body and another for the lid and can assemble a complete box in about 30 minutes.
    The tools needed are a stanley knife or box cutter knife, a tape measure, a biro, a pizza cutter for creasing the correx to make the folds and a piece of timber with a straight edge for folding the correx against.
    correx-nuc..jpg
    This is a prototype from a couple of years back. The current model is more stylish.

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    Do you put the political blether on the inside or the outside ? If on the outside ,do the bees show political preference?.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    I have one I just made where I put the head on the outside.
    I'll post a video on U tube when I have bees in it.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    This one has a 2010 mated queen.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYhM2-mhDAo

    Admin note: If you insert the URL using the filmstrip icon then it is displayed this way:

    Last edited by gavin; 01-07-2010 at 07:40 PM. Reason: Admin interference

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    Nice Nuc.
    Cheapest I have seen is a banana box with polystyrene blocks to hold the frames up.
    The standard banana box size is just perfect for the Zander frames. Perfect is you have bees in a bee house.
    I take it you make the lid out of something porous - so the bees don't sweat in winter / prevent mildew & mold - or do you just lay an old tea towel between the lid and the frame tops?

  6. #6
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Calum View Post
    I take it you make the lid out of something porous
    The lid is made out of the same stuff. There is a 50 mm gap between the top of the frames and the underside of the lid which I intend to fill with fondant and/or insulation.
    Polyhives don't breathe either and bees seem to overwinter fine in them.
    I overwintered several nucs in these last winter although I have them primarily for summer use.
    In winter I tape polystyrene to the front back and top and there is polystyrene inside the two pieces which hold the frames up.
    I have 14 nucs in these contraptions at the moment, 7 with mated queens and 7 still with virgins.
    They have an internal sliding correx frame so they work as anything from a 2 frame mating nuc to a 7 frame nuc ready to be transferred to a full size brood box.
    I use Thorne seconds cedar nationals for my brood boxes but I cannot understand for the life of me why people pay up to £40 for a nuc box when you can make one for 50p.

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    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    That was *so* good, thanks Jon! You might have heard my chuckling on the breeze coming in from the Netherlands.

    Do you get the full effect from a half Jim Nicholson?

    Reminds me - in some perverted backwards way - of this classic:


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    Jon - that's pure inspiration!!!

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    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    Hi Jon

    Been following your burgeoning Bee Media Tart career with interest. Nice to see Dromore giving you a good write-up too:

    http://tinyurl.com/bnml3e2

    The scroll bar on the left suggests that there are more pictures below the side-on view, but it wont scroll for me. Are there more?

    So, that lid. Presumably you cut a piece to cover the 18x10 inch surface with enough for a rim of an inch or so (maybe even a couple of cm), make the freeing cuts, use your pizza cutter to crease just beyond the 18x10, fold and tape?

    Given that I have some vigorous stocks at the moment maybe I need a few of these in the garage ready for next spring. For those worried about the aesthetic niceties, a quick swipe with a roller brush would make them prettier (unless of course there was an image on the board worth leaving - could always add a new one of course).

    cheers

    Gavin

  10. #10
    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    For the lid, you cut a poster in 4.
    The complete poster measures 48" by 32" so you can make 4 lids each from a piece 24" by 16"
    The lid need to fit tightly to avoid blowing off. It measures 18 and a wee bit by 10 and a wee bit so the sides are a wee bit under 3"
    If you make it too tight you can correct things by slackening the duct tape.

    I re recorded an old favourite this morning.


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