Andy:
    I am guessing that you need to dry bees from alcohol preservation?
In this case I have learned a few tips from the folks at the Biosystematics
Research Centre, Ottawa.  First, take the bees and soak them for a FEW
minutes in water saturated with CASCADE (yes, the dishwasher crystals!).  This
rem,oves all gunk from the bees (pollens, oils, etc. that will mat the hairs
down.  Then, move to 70% EtOH, then 95% EtOH or stronger.
   Then, you have several options:
    a) put under a desk lamp tyo dry fairly quickly - when getting dry, use a
small paint- brush (camels-hair or otherwise) and brush the specimen back and f
orth to fluff up the pile, or
    b) put into a small stitched-up pouch of insect netting (if you have a bucn
h of them) and put in an electric clothes dryer along with something like
handkerchiefs!  DO NOT LEAVE IN TOO LONG AND CHECK FREQUENTLY or you will end u
p with a nice-looking bee body and a bunch of fragmented legs and tarsi!
   Some people have luck with b) but I prefer a) becuase I have more control
over results.
   The other option is to use a critical point dryer and depressurize very slow
ly (some museums and many electron microscope labs have these).
   I think a) is pretty easy and often leads to pretty lifelike specimens.
I hope this is what you were after.  I use it a lot on bees from malaise traps.
                      Cheers, Jim Whitfield, Univ. Arkansas.