It is pretty clear that unbridled drone production drastically reduces honey production. The standard frame colonies made about twice as much honey.

Tom Seeley examined the impact on a colony's honey production of providing it with a natural amount (20%) of drone comb. Over 3 summers, for the period mid May to late August, he measured the weight gains of 10 colonies, 5 with drone comb and 5 without it. Colonies with drone comb gained only 25 kg whereas those without drone comb gained 48.8 kg. 

SEE:
The effect of drone comb on a honey bee colony's production of honey
Thomas D. Seeley, Department of Neurobiology and Behavior, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
Apidologie

             ***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software.  For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html

Access BEE-L directly at:
http://community.lsoft.com/scripts/wa-LSOFTDONATIONS.exe?A0=BEE-L