Hello Jay & All,
Most problems encountered with raw honey crystallizing fast comes from
the handling process.  Supers which have crystals from the year before.
Supers left on in the fall and exposed to temperatures around the
57F.range .  Temperature around 57 F. in the holding area and with many
large operations drums which are clean but not washed with hot enough
water to remove tiny crystals in lower bottom where the bottom fits the
side.   Many hobby beekeepers bring their supers into the unheated
garage and extract the next weekend.   With starter crystals honey will
crystallize best at 57F. over a eight day period.
In a larger operation for you which don't know this fact the EPA will
not let you wash drums into the sewer system.  Liquid Sugars in Kansas
City and EPA have had many bouts over the problem.  Now the wash is
pumped into a railroad tanker.  All large packing plants will exchange
or save your drums(they say they won't) but for the reason above WILL
NOT wash out the drums.   Because the drum has had the lid put back on
and honey is hard to contaminate and its illegal to wash in sewer
systems many drums are simply refilled with honey again.  I wash mine
into a long  container and let the bees clean up the leftovers and then
final rinse with hot water before refilling which the EPA will let you
do.

Jay Mowat wrote:
  I'm actually trying to keep a small amount of honey lquified for some
good customers of mine. Does anyone have some rules of thumb?

If you are doing *raw unheated honey* you need to remove from the bees
and extract right( within two days) away and put in a clean container
which is crystal free.  Then protect in either direction from the 57F.
degree temp which honey crystallizes at best. Not over 80F. but as cold
as you want.

 Temperature?

If you want to be sure the honey will have a reasonable crystal free
shelf life you need to heat to at least 120 to 150F. In a crystal free
container after heating to remove crystals and stored in the proper
temperature the honey should keep for a few months with only minor
crystallization at the bottom of the container if any crystallization at
all.

 Length of storage time?

Putting the honey in a freezer keeps my comb honey crystal free for a
year but I have never tried any longer.  There was a post earlier  this
month about a freezer not helping.  I don't know why the process didn't
work for the writer of the post but science has proven it almost stops
the crystallization process.

 Does it matter what the type of  honey is?

Any honey which crystalizes fast will crystallize fast in storage unless
heated as if for sale in the stores to remove the starter crystals.
Certain honey is known to crystalize so fast it will even at times
crystalize in the supers. I could write a book about the above but will
stop here and hope most questions are answered.
Sincerely,
Bob Harrison