The Recent ABJ article on Hogg Half Combs piqued my interest and I'm
anxious to do a personal comparison to the Ross Round Sections.  I
ordered and received my conversion kit for Hogg Half Combs (HHC).  The
Hogg system is just different enough from the Ross Rounds to warrant
conversion kits for those who aren't equipped with the carpentry tools
to work the wood.  The long follower boards (fbs) are made of pressed
composite board, and are machined so they have little feet on the bottom
and slightly routed on the top.  The purpose of the feet is to have the
fbs stand on tin supports nailed on the bottom of the super and allow
bees to pass under the fbs.  The short width fbs are made of the same
material as an inner cover (mason board is it called?), hence they're
only 1/4 in thick.  One each of a short and long fb are nailed to the
super with a spacer between the fb and the super wall.  The other two
fbs are held in place with super springs.  Once a super is converted,
loading the Hogg cassettes takes about a minute!  A considerable labor
saver over the Ross Rounds.  But then you're into the same production
concerns that have always been associated with the square vs round
sections.  I'm wondering if the bees will avoid the corners.  I'm also
skeptical about the claim that seeing through the plastic encourages
the bees to fill the cassettes faster, although recent color discussion
on BEE-L offers reasonable speculation.  And a final concern I have is
that the plastic cassettes make it impossible to cut through the comb
section.  The consumer will have to scrape the comb off the bottom of
the plastic cassette rather than cutting out a chunk of the Ross Round.
The midrib foundation is not present in the Hogg cassette so the
beeswax will be more delicate, but I'm not sure that will matter to
the consumer.
 
Doing some arithmetic to compare profit margins between the two systems
was also revealing.  My analysis excludes labor costs to prepare the
supers, as I am a small potatoes hobbiest and my labor costs are my own
free time.  Unfortunately I don't have my scratch pad here as I type
this, so the figures I'm about to quote are from memory.  I usually sell
my produce in lots of a dozen to vegetable stands and country markets
and target $25 for a dozen rounds.  I figured my cost for a round
section to include the cost of the rings, foundation, covers, labels
and honey (with a honey price of .08 cents per oz), which comes to about
$17 and change for a dozen rounds or about $7 and change profit on a
dozen rounds.  If I do the same math for the HHC, my cost price is
about $23 and change, so for the same profit margin I need to sell a
dozen for about $31, so my customers' customers will have to pay more
for the final product (which is reasonable because they'll be purchasing
4 oz more of honey) but human nature is such that I suspect the customer
will object to a price higher than what they've become accustomed to in
the RRs.  But this is merely speculation on my part and I really won't
know how the marketplace plays out until this summer.  Labor savings for
HHCs are undeniably significant, especially if one is paying hired help.
But it may be the case that what one saves in labor could be lost in
production by the bees or sales at the marketplace or both.
 
At this point in time I'm leaning towards the RR, but I suspect that I
may be exhibiting a certain amount of resistance to change.  Final
analysis will be made around Labor Day.
 
Aaron Morris - I think, therefore I bee!