My Flow Frames are difficult to remove for inspection

That is a lovely frame of honey!! Thanks for posting photos.
Now, sorry to hijack your post, I was curious to know how hard is it to pull out a flow frame? I tried taking one out before adding the super on, so brand new frames, but we might have overdone the “let the frames sit tightly in the box” part, and now I can’t pull them out. My fingers don’t fit between the frames, and I didn’t want to pry my hive tool too deep between the box and the frame so not to damage either. Are some hive tools better than others? Is it better to use one tool in each hand or just one tool should be enough? Thanks!!

Thanks, I do know what you mean - they are in pretty snug. It does seem to get a little harder again to get them out once the bees have started to add their own ‘glue’ as well. The flow frames are also a bit heavier than the traditional frames when full of honey so that can add to the awkwardness.

I just treat them like any frame though and use the regular J hive tool to gently nudge them one way and back again to break any propolis, then standing side on to the super, I lever the hive tool hook under the front part of the frame with my right hand and find I can actually pick the rear facing end of the frame up with my two fingers due to the finger sized recesses in the cap on the end.

I did have to make sure I used the tool to scrape all the propolis off the edges of the frames before I reinserted them, otherwise they wouldn’t go back in neatly and in one case overlapped with another frame edge so that it wasn’t forming a nice flat window when you took the back panel off.

I don’t have access to my photos at the moment to show you what I mean so I hope that makes sense.

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Thanks @busso. I am very new to the forum, and I don’t think I have enough posts to start a new thread, but slowly earning my stripes, hehe. I appreciate your help!! :bee:

I just wanted to add to this comment after doing an inspection today and having some more trouble getting the Flow frames back in nice and flush. It was quite a tight fit as SeesideBees1 mentioned above.

I found that if I took the rear access panel off the back and inserted the outside Flow frames first I could use my hive to tool or hand to make sure not just the top of the frame but the bottom of the frame as well was completely pushed up against the hive side before trying to insert the next one. This meant that by the time I was inserting the final one in the middle of the hive, there was the best possible chance of having it slide in a little easier and form a nice flush window at the back with no gaps or overlapping edges.

Hope this helps someone.

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