Hi Jeff- yes but there are so many things about keeping bees that novices with or without a Flow hive would probably consider to be in the realms of an unpleasant surprise, even though they are necessities of the hobby. If one was to fully explain all those things, they would probably turn around and take their money with them, with just a cursory glance at the Flow hive -wouldn’t they? Things like weekly inspections with many angry bees trying to sting you, burr comb gluing everything together -like frames in boxes you are trying to lift, smoke all over them and down their lungs, the unbearable heat once in the suit, the diseases of the brood, the small hive beetles and slime outs, the cutting out of drone comb, the pain etc. of the stings, swarms and swarm mitigation etc. etc. …
Many of us don’t mind these things - as the benefits and interest of the hobby outweigh them, but there are probably many hobby beekeepers out there wondering how they managed to misunderstand it all so much.
Yes I agree Dan, the flow team do tell folks to join a bee club & learn beekeeping. It’s been said many times that the only difference between a flow hive & a traditional hive, is the process of extracting the honey. The bloke we spoke to yesterday (the 80 year old) bought a flow hive with the understanding that all he needs to do in order to harvest the honey is turn the key & the honey will flow. He didn’t want to purchase an extractor. Now he realizes that he will need to do as others have done, & build an extracting bench. It’s a shame that he had to be shown why & told this by someone else after he made his purchase.
One needs to understand that a big amount of leakage is the exception, not the norm.
All it takes is careful assembly of the flow box and frames and harvest at the correct time.
We are fortunate in Australia that we don’t have to take the super off for winter under normal conditions and therefore never have to deal with uncapped honey cells.
“Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly.”
-deadly little thing eh?
https://www.honeyflow.com/faqs/all/leaking-honey-from-my-flow-hive/p/183?id=183
Hi Jeff - this link helps explain why, basically it can be due to a few things if it happens.
edit; I thought there was something else Cedar put out - perhaps a video or something, describing the cappings variation like you mentioned Jeff. Can’t find it now sorry…will keep searching.
Perhaps this sort of thing Jeff?
Hi Dan, they mentioned “inverted cappings”. They have covered themselves with the information in that link. I guess a prospective customer would need to do their research before making their purchase.
I just saw your edit. That’s exactly what I’ve been talking about Ed.
Edit: as you can imagine, the wax of the wet capping would be more inclined to move with the honey (causing the leak) because of the surface tension over the honey, whereas the dry cappings should stay put, as the honey drains away from it because of the lack of contact with it & minimal surface tension. I’m sure that Dr Karl would be able to explain it better.
Thanks for the link Dan2. Now I see what Jeff is talking about.
Yes, my Italians do both in different sections. The Carniolans about equally.
Doesn’t seem to do a difference to leaking. Well, mine don’t leak either way.
well who can say why exactly- but I am sure happy I havn’t really experienced many problems at all and have now harvested well over 150 KG’s of honey through flow frames. I havn’t had any issue with propolis- leaking has been minimal or non-existant and my wires are tight. 
Same here no really issues other than difficulties cracking the first couple of cells. We use two keys now one to each side to spread the load and only about 100mm in at a time.
We only ever do a frame or two at any given time.
Flow may have to put an extra spacing lug top and bottom in the middle to prevent flex. I can see a bit of flex with my hybrid on the flow frame closest the standard frame because the bottoms don’t touch as they do when you have a super filled with flow frames.
Some Flow owners here in the US have commented about propolis in the frames. This typically happens to newbies who are unaccustomed to paying attention to seasonal cues & are putting the super on when there isn’t a nectar flow. I know that many areas in Aus have nearly year-round nectar flow, but are there small dearths now and then, perhaps times when bees would prefer to seal up cracks on all that extra space?
I have a Flow frame here that was on last summer but is yet to go onto a hive yet and after Jeffs comment about excessive propolis I had an inspection of it and it was not sticky with propolis just waxy. I also looked at the bottom around where the leakage had occurred on Jeffs frame. I’m thinking the excessive propolis is the key here. Perhaps the super was put on way too early and instead of wax it was propolized? This has been noted before. Could then the propolis not have separated and stretched like the gum it is not allowing the honey to Flow into the channel? Perhaps the bees are just propolis junkies… Wet cap or dry cap the honey should still flow down hill provided the way is clear and the channel not full either.
I reckon if Jeff tried from scratch there wouldn’t be these issues. There’s nothing worse than coming into a project towards the end not knowing all the preceding steps had been carried out correctly. I could get a full super from someone who went foundationless and it be full of cross comb and assume foundationless is useless but we know that is not true. Spacing, inspections and management will mitigate cross comb issues. There are many Flow owners who have had much success yet it seems once again the minority seems to rule. One of the reasons I like bees is because they don’t have this problem.
Rant over.
Good detective work!
I wondered about the propolis issue too. I hardly have any on the frames.
True, many new flow owners put the flow box on way too early.
Hi @skeggley, the sticky propolis was on the outside of the frames. It was quite challenging handling the frames in order to rinse the channels out before draining & drying them to get rid of the rancid smell. That was before putting them back in box to set up to extract the honey.
My bees are cleaning up the frames. Once that is done, a closer examination will reveal whether there is propolis inside the cells or not.
I understand that it would be difficult for some people to understand the difference that wet cappings vs dry cappings would make. However take a close look at Heron’s photo, it’s in this thread, posted on the 25th of August, the bottom photo. You can clearly see how that the cappings have shifted, allowing honey to run through those gaps & down onto the tray that he provided. As you can see, they are wet caps & fully capped.
I fully agree that honey flows down hill, most of it did in Heron’s & my case. However the excessive amount that didn’t flow down hill was just too excessive, in my view for the bees to cope with all at once.
Bees can cope with minor spills. However as I observed in my observation hive, I mentioned this on the forum a while back that when I put an excessive amount of honey into my observation hive, the bees couldn’t keep up with it. While they were busy trying to keep up with the honey & getting it off their bodies, the SHBs that are normally kept at bay started running all over the place, looking at where they can lay eggs.
The very first account that I heard of anyone here on the Sunshine Coast harvesting from a flow hive was a bloke who harvested from his flow frames. He experienced honey dripping through the core flute, just like photos that had been posted on here at that time. Then a few days after that he phoned me for advice about SHB, because he was getting slymed out. About a weak earlier he came & bought some foundation from me, that was the first time I met him.
I suspected then that the honey spill over the brood & onto the core flute was the trigger for his SHB infestation.
Did he or all of the other folks on the Sunshine Coast set their flow hives up wrong? I have no idea.
Hi Jeff
It sounds like it could be a variety of factors at play here from what is being said. It probably needs some proper experimentation(you know like the scientists do), to get to the bottom of it. The lack of that air pocket in the capping, or the genetics of the bees (not saying there is anything wrong with the bees there!), or the timing of the Flow super might all play a role, but we are just guessing at this time. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t guess, and it is good that we are theorising because it is good to have answers at the end of the day, and this is a step in the process. If you look at the latest video on Flow Facebook page, Cedar is extracting in the rain, but it was interesting to see how high his bees had built out the comb on the Flow frames. Bees will build them out at different heights of course. Perhaps that makes a difference too?
Or way too late… 
Hi Dan, your closing statement is the focus of my latest observation. @skeggley There is no propolis inside the flow mechanism to hinder the flow of honey, so we can rule that out.
Back to Dan, upon inspecting the frames, I also discovered that the bees aren’t removing the caps in order to empty the honey out. I guess in time they would have removed the caps if they were hungry enough. But I was keen to see if there was any propolis inside the frames. HOWEVER, MY LATEST OBSERVATION.:- In the end I started removing the cappings with a putty knife by going under the caps. That’s when I noticed that a lot of caps were well out from the moving mechanism, but a lot of caps were right on top of the moving mechanism. It’s the caps that are right on top or very close to the moving mechanism that, coupled with being wet wouldn’t stand a chance of holding together & not leaking externally.
I can clearly see how that the caps in the areas where the comb is built well out would hold together (maybe not wet cappings).
I see this all the time while extracting honey. Sometimes the bees build one comb out full. While at the same time the opposite comb is built shallow. It’s just something that bees do.
Even by using 9 frames in 10 frame supers, I still get some frames where the cappings are concaved. In finding them, naturally the opposing frames will be more convexed than normal.
In a perfect beekeeping world, by using 9 frames in a 10 frame honey super, every side should be convexed & easy to decap. But that’s not always the case.
My conclusion is that a lot of the flooding could stem from uneven comb buildup, some full, some shallow, coupled with wet caps.
hello Jeff,
I have found that the bees tend to cap some of my flow frames right at the mechanism level- when those frames are on the south side of my hives. Generally it’s the frames that the bees cap last- in my hives they all seem to cap from north to south with the south being the last to get fully capped. I’m not sure if that’s because those tend to be the warmest frames facing the sun more but it seems that way.
As to the bees removing the cappings- they always do in my experience- only sometimes they leave sections for a while- I am guessing if they are busy elsewhere.
G’day Jack, if I didn’t get under the caps with a putty knife, the penny wouldn’t have dropped. As soon as that happened, it all made sense.
I only had the super sitting oven an empty super on a nuc size colony. I could see that in some cases they were removing the caps. I’m fixing the super up now to get ready to paint it all white. I think they’ll handle the heat better if the whole thing is painted white. In the mean time I put the flow frames in standard boxes on an angle to get cleaned up.
I cut the guts out of the crown board. I fit the outside frame under the roof. I’m fitting the ply over the sbb with the help of some automotive body filler I had sitting around. I’m just waiting for it to go off so I can continue.