I believe I should come to the defense of us maligned Australians and I would hope that those reading this will see it as "informed" comment.

The first written word that I read came from research in the USA in the later 70's.  It stated that wax dipping did not preserve wood ware used in beekeeping against decay.  I started looking, with a collegue, at bee box preservation in 1979 and first published on this in 1980.  Some points to consider in this deabte are.

Firstly, if you are not in a decay hazard area, you don't have to treat wood ware.  There is no risk. Beekeepers in Australia first saw wax dipping in New Zealand,  However, when they came back to Australia they did not include the copper naphthenate.  So, the boxes they dipped did not stop decay (rot).  The areas where these hives were is a high decay hazard area.

Another factor in this debate is what is the natural durability of the timber.  If it has high natural durability, then it will not need any treatment to stop rot.

Those who use copper naphthenate are getting the preserving factor from the copper and not the wax dipping.  Also, in Australia, copper naphthenate does not afford any protection against termites (white ants) and all text books will say the same.  I personally have hives treated with copper naphthenate that have been severely degraded by termites.  It depends on how vicious the termites are.  Here in Australia, there is one species of termites which are recorded as eating billard balls on a billard table.

As for the heat sterilising the timber in the wax dipping process, it could be the case but it affords no protection against re-infestion by the fungus. There was an article in Bee Biz on the Plato process but I believe it is still experimental at this time.

So in summary, wax dipping alone affords no long lasting protection to low durability timbers against fungal attack in medium to high decay hazard areas nor termite attack against aggressive termite species.

Trevor Weatherhead
AUSTRALIA.