> quote from 1948  Dadant advertisement for crimp wire foundation:
> "With *twenty-three* worker cells to the *square inch*

Visit http://www.honeybeeworld.com/misc/cellcount.htm
to make comparisons if you like, but I can only conclude that the ad writer
made the common error of measuring the number of cells in an inch
horizontally, then squaring that number to get cells per square inch.

As we all know by now, that is incorrect, and based on the assumption that a
cell is the same in height overall, as in width.  It is not.

The number of cells in an inch, measured vertically, is different from the
number of cells in an inch measured horizontally.

The page mentioned above goes through the logic and explains some of the
fallacies and misinterretations that have made this simple matter a source
of endless confusion.  Interestingly, conversions from linear measurements
to area measurements, then back, seem to have resulted in some serious
misunderstandings in the past and even today.

My guess, and it is only a guess, is that the cells being examined by the
writer were 5.3mm, since on the chart, 5.3mm corresponds to 4.79 cells per
linear inch horizontally.  If you square 4.79, you get 22.9.  That is
essentially the number 23.

Otherwise 23 corresponds to 5.7mm on the lookup chart, and although Dadant
tended to make everything a bit bigger than Root, 5.7mm is *much* bigger
than any US comb I have heard about, but is a size made by Thorne to this
day AFAIK.  I wonder if Thorne made a conversion error.

Such large cells in brood comb, might even explain some of unique
difficulties experienced by UK beekeepers.  We found 5.25 noticably
outperformed even 5.3 in a controlled, but unpublished experiment.

I'm looking forward to other interpretations.

allen
http://www.honeybeeworld.com/diary/

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