I looked up the posts on pressure washers and they had good info. I bought a
Karcher 1550psi electric washer for $100 at Walmart (after researching in on
line).

I had a bunch of old frames that were in the round tuit bin and had been
gathering dust. Also had some old drawn fames (from my small cell downsizing
experiment) that I experimented with to see if I could melt the wax and
honey by putting them in a sealed galvanized garbage can out in the sun,
last year. Promptly forgot about them since the experiment did not work and
they were large cell.

I had a major cleanup of my bee house and decided to clean up the old
frames, hence the purchase of the washer. As all here know, cleaning a frame
by hand is a bit of a pain, especially getting wax and propolis out of nooks
and crannies.

As the posts noted, you do get wet, but the frames came back to life. They
went from gray to a nice orange of old mellow pine. Many even had a new wood
color. I have Carnies so propolis is a major cleaning problem, but not with
the washer. Totally amazed.

My set-up was simple, a shallow super to support them and keep them
confined, and five frames at a time. I had an old rug under everything to
keep it clean and not destroy the grass. Hit the tops first and then bottom
bars and sides, turning them like a page in a book, then turned them over
and did the other side. Took about a minute or less a frame.

The frames that I took out of the garbage can were covered with some wax
moth webs and stunk of fermenting honey. I moved the spray back a bit for
them (the spray nozzle was a rotating thin and powerful spray- the kit comes
with two nozzles, one, which I used is the power blaster and the other is
more for genteel cleaning, like siding.) Again, as the posts noted, the
sprayer cleaned out the cells, including the webs, and I was able to salvage
just about all of them. They were on plastic foundation, so I had to go down
to the plastic in some areas of only a few frames. Otherwise, the sprayer
cleaned them out perfectly. You do get blowback (as noted in the posts) and
I was covered with cell cappings.

In all, it was the first time I have ever enjoyed cleaning frames. It was
fun.

I am sure many here have used pressuer washers and this is not new, but for
those who have not, it is a good investment. Plus, you can use it to clean
lots more, like house and car.

After I finished I dipped the bare frames in a chlorine bath and they will
dry in the sun tomorrow, so they should be in good shape for use in the
future. The drawn comb frames go on a recently hived swarm.

Bill Truesdell
Bath, Maine

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