foundation mold

foundation embossing device - silicone rollers

ideal for beekeepers who are not so skilled in crafts
Alternative to self-construction of a silicone mold,

self separating silicone,
removal of the wax foundations very easy,

Here we offer the silicone rollers. The silicone matrices are offered on this page.

for all countries and the spanish peninsula without taxes

More details

foundation embossing device - silicone rollers

complete embossing device with roller:

scope of delivery:

scope of delivery:

- rolling system with silicone rollers mounted on a base plate
- both rollers driven by gears
- bearing blocks of hardwood
- compression springs with 4 adjusting nuts

additionally required material:

- 2 plywood panels 10mm thick 30.5cm x 50cm chamfered on one narrow side as a worktop
- 2 wooden strips 30.5 cm x 7.5 cm x 2.5 cm to support the worktops (2 strips are already attached to the roller to support the worktops)
- 8 countersunk wood screws 3.5 x 30mm for fastening the worktops to the wodden strips
- 2 red light bulbs 250W with base and cable

This is how it looks with the attached worktops (not included in the scope of delivery):

The idea of offering beekeepers who are not so skilled in crafts an alternative to making their own foundations has been maturing for a long time. With the new embossing device, this is now very easy.

- How does this work?
First you have to make flat sheets of wax, which is easily done by dipping a sheet of plywood two or three times in liquid wax. The video shows how to do it - very simple. The wax sheets will detach themselves easy from the plywood, which must be the size of the foundation.

- what do you need for that?
On the one hand you need the silicone matrices offered here and on the other hand a rolling device also offered here. We have decided to offer the rollers here as well, because what is available on the market as cheap goods has, to our astonishment, errors in the concentricity of the rollers of 4 to 5mm!!!!. And in any case, both rollers should be driven, which is given by 2 gear wheels in our roller device.

- how to proceed?
The prepared flat sheets of wax are heated evenly with 2 red light lamps, each with 250 watts. This can all be seen in detail in our video and is pretty quick. When the middle wall has reached approx. 40°C, it is placed between the upper and lower part of the silicone matrices and the closed matrices are slowly driven through the rollers with the handwheel and then back again. If the wax temperature is correct and the pressure on the roller springs is set correctly (approx. 15 turns of the pressure spring adjuster), the wax foundation is perfectly embossed without cell distortion and can be removed very easily without a release agent. - Finished!

Silicone matrices for embossing foundations using rollers:

complete embossing device with rollers:

with a new cell geometry that is better accepted by the bees

At the moment only available in Langstroth size (420mm x 200mm) and Dadant size (420mm x 260mm) and in cell sizes of 4.9mm and 5.1mm.
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The new cell geometry

Dee Lusby writes in her webpage that one should use

foundation without pronounced cell walls.

Well I made tests and to my surprise came out the following:

I added to several hives complete supers with 11 frames. Alternating foundations with the new cell geometry and foundation after the swedish model, which has cell imprints similar to what is used anywhere. A swedish, a new one, a swedish, a new one ……. all the box like this. It was used the same wax and the same cell dimensiones between 4,8 and 4,85mm.
All this with a good nectar flow.
Next day all the hives had built combs in the frames with foundation of the new geometry and the swedish ones were not built.

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So the decision matured to build foundation molds with this new cell geometry, since the foundation on the market almost all have large errors en cell measurement.