I believe that by placing a  ripe queen cell in the super forces the workers in the hive to make a decision,  to supercede or not. If the queen is not superceded than the workers must perceive the queen as strong. If Charles and others that requeen by placing cells this way didn't see success I am sure they would be forced to change or go belly up. Should success be seen as how many cells actually completed the supercedure or did the the hive stay strong and overwintered. Would a study of this procedure be better served by taking a group of hives and requeening them by cells in the supers vs by mated queen in cage introduction after original queen found and removed. Then not only measuring the success of supercedure and acceptance by how many hives made it into the next year and their strength. Have this study measured over a few years. 

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