A question for you wood working guys about bee hives

[virginiasmokesignal]

Al,

I printed off your drawing and some of the other ones here, showed them to my cousin and my barber after Church yesterday,  Both said they were not sure about what kind of hives you were doing that did not have a bottom but both said it looks like an add box for a super.  Both said they would go with the rabbit joint with some good strong glue and a couple of screws and let everything dry good before you put your bees in it.  The barber said he had done it that way before with no problems although he bought most of his supers and they had little dove tail joints to hold all the corners together.  When I showed my cousin he said that he had seen it done that way but all of his supers had the dove tail joints on them.  However my cousin is a pretty good carpenter and he said that the rabbit joint with a good strong glue and a couple of screws would work fine.  Sorry I was so long getting back to you but that is what the two bee keepers said.  Like I said, I know nothing about Bee Keeping but I do know those guys have all the honey they want and both sell a ton of honey to others, both have a small fortune in honey equipment and bee hives, supers and all kinds of bee keeping equipment.  Hope this helps

Your SMF Friend,

Barry 

 

[alblancher]

It does help Barry,  Thanks

Al

 

[Bearcarver]

Al,

Just found this thread.

How strong do you want them?

I would go with a rabbet joint at each corner, with a good exterior glue (Gorilla), and pre-drill & deck screw them together.

If you use Gorilla glue, make real sure you clamp them good, as that stuff will expand & push the joints apart if not clamped!

Then if you want to beef them up a bit, get some cheap 3" X 3" angle brackets & add one at the top & one at the bottom of each corner. I look for a bulk buy of them, as that would be 8 for each box.

Just my two cents,

Bear

 

[alelover]

Bear knows wood.

 

[bbqking]

Al,

I would agree with Jerry S. I think the pocket hole with some gorilla glue will do the trick. I use the Kreg for almost all of my joinery. Let us know which way you decide to go and don't forget us when the honey starts flowing!

Kent

 

[eman]

Just make sure they have their green card and a VALID SSN!

 

 And if they don't just send them up the road and they can buy one.

 

[Bearcarver]

BTW Al,

I got a mess of Carpenter Bees that get after my Log House every year.

I caught over 200, each of the last two years.

I could hire some out to you, and they could build those boxes for you!!!!

If you were going to use 3/8" dowels, they could drill all of your holes for ya!

Bear

 

[justpassingthru]

The problem I've had when using screws in the end grain of plywood is it tends to splits the plies, granted predrilling helps, but I've still had problems.  A pocket jig eliminates this problem because the screws go through the plies and is a very strong joint, but then you have to fill the pocket with a plug and sand it flush.

Personally I would cut the rabbets with a table saw (without a dado blade), set the fence at the correct distance and cut the tongue standing up, then lay it flat and cut out the rabbet.  I don't know what Gorilla glue is, but if it has a high tensile strength I'd just glue the joint and clamp it until it dries and not use any fasteners, I mean, there isn't any shear force being added to these boxes, ...they're just bee hives.

As for cutting the end pieces I would cut them also on the table saw, cut the first one too long, place it in the side pieces and measure the outside dimension, subtract from that the actual dimension and that is how much you need to cut off, or if your not comfortable with cutting them on a table saw because it might bind, then you could screw a miter saw down to a work surface and screw a stop to the work surface at the correct distance and cut the side and ends that way.

Gene