Beekeeping with the Warré hive -- Gatineau Lift, Heaf Version

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Warré Beekeeping

Example construction of a Warré hive lift

Left:
A version of the Marc Gatineau lift (with a Warré hive body and quilt on the fork for demonstration purposes). The design exploits the projecting handles of the Warré hive body. This lift easily picks up a person of 65 kg.

Construction details of this lift (referring to the photo, starting at the top)

Except for the pulleys and cord, this version of the Marc Gatineau lift was made out of bits and pieces lying around the workshop. The windlass is from an old two-frame tangential honey extractor. The design was essentially copied from http://ruche-warre.levillage.org/La visite de printemps.htm. Its principle is somewhat similar to that of the guillotine used in France after the 1789 revolution. The white board slides in a groove, upwards through turning the windlass and downwards under the weight of the hive, but controlled by the windlass.

Top beam 517 x 53 x 44 mm
Overall height: 1245 mm (could usefully be made taller).
Top back bracing board 150 x 19 mm set out on spacers 13 mm thick to clear pulley.
Windlass bar, steel 16 mm thick. Passes through greased bushes in the frame cut from scrap steel pipe.
Top pulley tied over top beam with loop of cord.
Windlass crank length 178 mm.
Two pulleys each with two wheels; bought from a yacht chandlers.
Bottom pulley tied with a cord to a bracket on the back of the white sliding board; bracket secured with the two bolts whose heads are visible in the photo.
Frame uprights 53 x 44 mm. The 44 mm is the front surface as viewed.
Distance between uprights: 432 mm.
White board: 13 mm thick good quality plywood; 425 mm high x 456 mm wide set in grooves (13 mm deep, 15 mm wide) in the uprights.
Board sides and upright's groove beeswaxed before assembly.
Fork tine length: 356 mm.
Fork height and width: 100 x 32 mm. The gap between the fork tines must be tailored to the Warré hive-body box to be used, allowing some clearance to ease sliding the fork into place, say 3-6 mm each side. The box used in this example is 350 mm wide.
Bottom back bracing board 150 x 19 mm; glued and screwed to upright.
Triangular side bracing boards: 300 x 300 x 13 mm plywood.
Foot: 425 x 95 x 44 mm.

Make a strong joint between fork tine and board: On the bottom of the back of the 13 mm thick white board is glued another plywood board measuring 413 mm x 200 mm x 19 mm. The tines of the fork are cut perfectly square at the ends and butt-jointed with glue onto the board and clamped in place at right angles with the help of supporting blocks. When the glue is dry, two 100 mm wood screws are screwed into the tines through holes drilled and countersunk into the back. The screws are size 12, i.e. 6 mm thick at the widest end. The screws were lubricated with wood glue so any play was taken up by the glue as it set. The extra board glued on the back takes the vertically sliding unit ('guillotine blade') to a thickness of 32 mm and confers great rigidity. It must clear the inner edges of the uprights. The clearance here is 9 mm.

If used on uneven ground, a thick plywood U-shaped board could be slid either side of the hive base to improve stability.

Lift plans

The plans below are for a lift essentially the same as the one above except that the uprights and top beam are all of 50 mm square timber and the tine spacing is 348 mm which is suitable for boxes of 20 mm thick wood. It gives a clearance between fork tine and box of 4 mm either side.

The fixing of the fork tines to the rear board requires careful attention. One method, the one used here, is described immediately above. A reinforcing board is glued to the back of the sliding fork board and the tines are mounted with glue and large screws. Other successful methods of mounting the tines include sturdy shelf brackets (see Steve Ham's lift below) and tee hinges (see Bill Wood's lift below).

lift_assembled.jpg (64478 bytes)

The top pulley is tied to the top beam and the bottom pulley to the fork board. The lifting cord is tied to the windlass axle, threaded through the two double pulleys and tied to the fork board. Pulleys are not essential but ease lifting of a tall, honey-laden hive and allow movement to be stopped at any point without securing the crank. The top rear board is set out on 13 mm spacers to clear the windlass cord and top pulley.

lift_exploded.gif (50541 bytes)

The windlass and crank handle could be made of steel pipe used for electrical conduit etc. or reclaimed from other machinery such as cars, mangles, honey extractors etc. An example of use of conduit is shown in the left photo immediately below. To increase durability of the windlass bearings, they may be lined with steel bushes and greased.

No effort has been made to reduce the weight of the above lift, which is somewhat heavy, but several dimensions could be reduced by a few millimetres without significant loss of rigidity, for example the thickness of the upright, top beam and feet as well as of the rear and triangular bracing boards. The fork board should not be thinner than 13 mm and if the tines are fixed in the way described above it is advisable to glue a reinforcing board to the back of the fork board in the region of the tines.

As can be seen in the photos below, useful accessories include wheels and a hive weighing scale.

Examples of other beekeeper's Warré lifts

lift_dardenne.jpg (24263 bytes) lift_gatineau.jpg (98941 bytes)