Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum

BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => EQUIPMENT USAGE, EXPERIMENTATION, HIVE PLANS, CONSTRUCTION TIPS AND TOOLS => Topic started by: czman11 on October 05, 2011, 03:11:50 pm

Title: bee vac hose size?
Post by: czman11 on October 05, 2011, 03:11:50 pm

Hi everyone. I just built my bee vac but did not make a hole for a hose yet. I am hoping some of you may give me a good input on this subject. I have a 6hp 'shop vac' motor attached to it and I would like to attach  transparent hose to it with "bear claw" attachment on the end. However, this hose is a lot wider than conventional vacuum cleaner hose. I have seen number of videos and almost all of them, accept one, show bee vacs with regular vacuum cleaner hose. I guess my worries are about leaving some of the bees behind inside the hose since it is not transparent.

Title: Re: bee vac hose size?
Post by: PeeVee on October 22, 2011, 07:28:22 am

I have used the 2" shop vac hose with success. But it is short. And I think I have had better luck with the 1 1/2" hose. In either case I have had to "rattle" the hose to get the last of the bees inside the box. I will be moving to pool vac hose next season just because of length.

I built the "Robo" design and feel it works well.

Title: Re: bee vac hose size?
Post by: G3farms on October 22, 2011, 10:51:11 am

No matter what size hose you decide to use, just be sure to get the suction down low enough to barely pull the bees into the hose. If it sounds like a hand full of ball bearings rattling down the pipe it ends up as dead bees. I use the 2 1/2" shop vac hose, can be found at lowes or HD or even some good yard sales.

Title: Re: bee vac hose size?
Post by: czman11 on October 22, 2011, 01:50:38 pm

Thanks all of you for your input. I was thinking about 4" transparent hose from Pen State Industries (http://www.pennstateind.com/store/D50C.html) . But knowing that all of you out there get around with regular 2" or 2.5" makes my life a little easier. My vacuum is finished, except the hose, so as soon as it is all together I will upload pictures so you guys can give me some constructive criticism.

Title: Re: bee vac hose size?
Post by: Robo on October 23, 2011, 11:50:10 am

2-1/2" is what I recommend.

http://www.beevac.com/videos/ (http://www.beevac.com/videos/)

Title: Re: bee vac hose size?
Post by: BlevinsBees on October 23, 2011, 03:11:59 pm

When I built mine this summer I was told not to use anything smaller than the 2 1/2" hose. Any narrower and the bees are bounced and dragged along the wall of the hose.  Made sense to me so I X'ed the 1 1/4" hose that came with the vac and bought a 2 1/2". So far, very low body count. In fact, you're not going to believe this but I have used it several times where I didn't have one dead bee!!

Title: Re: bee vac hose size?
Post by: G3farms on October 23, 2011, 07:43:59 pm

I find that I loose more bees when I suck them off of open cells of nectar/honey, it will pull a small amount of the honey out and coat the bees and inside of the hose. You need to be careful and not suck up the sticky stuff.