Just wondering if anybody else has experienced a warp in their observation window? I noticed that the bee space between the middle of the window and the first frame looked a little small. The window is bulging inwards leaving a 2-3 millimetre gap at the bottom of the window which the bees have filled up with propolis.
I pushed the propolis out, wondering if the bees had caused the bulge by overfilling the gap but that didn’t fix the problem. I am planning to pull the super off and take the window out, clean it off and re-seat the window on the weekend given the day time temps are warm enough.
I had a problem with small hive beetles pushing their way down into the gap between the window and the box when I first set the hive up and am considering using silicon to seal any remaining gaps when I re-seat the window.
Hi Wilfred - it is pine so was thinking along the same lines. I took a quick photo with the phone this morning which shows the gap - I will see if I can load it.
mine is similar. Mine was a tight fit because I hot wax dipped the hive which caused the wood to shrink a few mm’s against the grain. The bees have propolised the gaps- and I’m not too worried- it’s extra ventilation…
The perspex window should be held in place by 4 small screws that fit into corresponding slots in the perspex. I wonder if when the screws were tightened if they didn’t distort the perspex. The screws should be only tightened enough to hold the perspex in place, I can’t think of another reason for that to happen.
Regards Paul.
I think it also happens if the wood shrinks due to moisture and temperature changes. My perspex is the same. In future I might consider adding another two screws- as four do not seem to be quite enough to hold the perspex down evenly. On my own hives with windows I used 6 screws- and I also used perspex that was 1mm thicker.
