Does anyone know whether the thick manuka honey we find in the Far North of New Zealand will actually flow from a Flowhive?
When you find out let us know
Did you find out by now? @Rossjb
Did anyone work out of you can extract manuka from flow frames. My first crack at bee keeping & put my flow frames on when the manuka was in bloom in Auckland. Bees filled the 6 frames in 3 x weeks = awesome. However, after 3 hours opening / closing / jiggling the frames we only managed a handful of drops of honey. Looking up the pipe with a torch you see the occasional drip.
Thoughts / ideas?
Manuka honey and extracting it from a Flow Frame is is like trying to get car engine oil to mix with water. We have Mauka honey in Australia but here it is called ‘Jelly Bush honey’ the first sign I get of the bees foraging on it I switch the Flow Super off and fit fit a box with conventional frames and when they are capped scrape the comb off the foundation and do a crush and strain after heating the bucket of comb covered by a black plastic bag in the sun for a day, On a really hot sunny day you can even get it to go thru a strainer.
You might try taking a frame from the hive and put it in a black plastic bag in the sun on a really hot sunny day and you might get it to extract, I would do it with the frame off the hive in your warm kitchen.Ok, If you often get a Manuka flow I would have a box of conventional frames and do a crush and strain, I have an electric extractor a tried to spin it out but after an hour I might have a got a tea spoon of it. you can sell it for 5 to 6 times the price or even more, but in a Flow Frame your bees are playing a practical joke and laughing their heads off. 
Good luck, if you find a way there are many that would love to read an update from you.
Cheers
Thanks Peter, I had a crack today with limited success. 1.5 hours of agitating the honey with a stick and managed to harvest half a frame… Think I need another plan. Going to buy a comb to see if that speeds it up
Attempt agitating through repeated opening and closing of the Flow Frames. This has worked for my with partial crystallisation - Although the consistency is fairly different.
Put the Flow Frame into a sealed plastic bag placed in the sun on a hot day for 3 or 4 hours then extract in the kitchen. It has helped me with Jelly Bush honey when I goofed and the Flow super was on the hive. If your days are too cool you could try a hair drier with the frame cells open.
Your Manuka honey has the same properties as our Jelly Bush honey so far as extracting goes.
Cheers Sam
You could try a hair drier on a low heat setting to turn the crystallized honey back to a liquid Kieran. Another option is to put the frame in a black plastic bag in the sun for a long enough that it will flow down into the chamber.
Cheers
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Would just need to make sure UV can’t penetrate the plastic bag. I just had an idea from that, you could wrap a Flow Frame in a plastic bag and then dunk it into warm/hot water to heat quickly, without getting water into the honey. I wonder if this could possibly work with Jelly-brush too, will experiment next time I have crystallised honey and let you know - unless you get the chance first. 
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There is food for thought with that idea Kieran about the Flow Frame. When I’m on the ball as soon as I see Tea Tree in flow I remove the Flow Super and slip a traditional box on. Then to extract I use an egg slide and shave all the comb down to the foundation then crush and strain.
Jelly Bush honey doesn’t candy, at least up here, but extracting and filtering it a very different approach to normal honey and involving heating it is a great time saver…
I don’t think a frame in the sun for a few hours would cause a UV issue with the honey but I would be interested in your thoughts and reasoning. I’m always interested in other ideas that might apply to my bee keeping to fine tune it.
Cheers
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Swapping out for a conventional super box can be an easier task especially if you have a process, but there is still some experimentation that can be done when the opportunity presents itself with the Flow Frames, I am yet to work with thixotropic honey personally.
For the honey, it would not be an issue, but it would be for the integrity of the Flow Frames, as UV can damage them over time. i think a black bin bag would have a small level of resistance though.