randy wrote:
> A Dustin Mizer might work well with powdered sugar. It is used to spray
> powders on plants. It is hand cranked. If you google it you will see
> pictures and descriptions
>
>   

I tried one of these for sugar dusting, it has a couple of problems:

1. The concentration of powdered sugar in the air that it blows out is 
low, so it is pretty slow in delivering the dust.  This could probably 
be corrected by fooling with the screen in the feed hopper to make it 
convey faster.

2. It takes two hands to use (one to hold it, and one to crank it), so 
you don't have a hand free to hold frames, lift up hive bodies, or do 
any other manipulations. 

It is really pretty awkward to use for this purpose, although it would 
work just peachy for its intended purpose (applying insecticide dusts to 
plants).  The same sort of thing, but with a powered blower and an 
adjustable feed rate on the powder hopper, would work a lot better.

-- 
Tim Eisele
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