>  don't the same dangers apply to honeybees?

The short answer is that if inbreeding is deleterious to drones, then they should be physically impaired and would not be likely to compete with more vigorous drone on mating flights. They are essentially sperm with wings; the same competitive selection process applies to actual sperm. 

The long answer is that if the drone did succeed in mating with the queen and the resutant sperms did fertilize honey bee eggs, the proportion of bees from this cross would be relatively small and therefore would not likely impact on the colony dynamics as a whole. It is when the majority of the drones are inbred or the majority of the drones are too genetically similar to the queen, that the colony begins to suffer from symptoms of inbreeding, such shot brood, or loss of vigor. 

It appears that the honey bee mating system works continually to prevent that by 1) a high rate of genetic recombination when sperms and eggs are formed; 2) multiple mating with many drones to further diversify the colony genetic make-up; 3) mating far from the hive to minimize the risk of brother/sister matings; 4) and selection of actual drones to reduce the possibility of matings involving drones with loss of vigor due to inbreeding or disease, etc. 

Finally, even if bad drones smell different, the queen can hardly be aware of their scent since she is flying rapidly away from them and is upwind. There may be an odor or pheromone selection process within the queen that separates the sperm, but that would be utter speculation on my part. It is know that living eggs produce attractants to help sperm locate them. 

P

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