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Welcome to the site Lb :hi:

I would bet one of the videos you saw was me (soapy22bullet).
Yup! Glad you made it, and the Robo vac. :)

QUESTION: I have an old 1.5 hp shop vac and plan to mount it permanently in the top portion of a robo vac over an 8 frame box. Will that be too small? With attention to the seal between components, it could work.

I used the original shop vac with a Tidy Cat bucket to vacuum some bees from a water valve box and it worked OK. Don't plan to make a career of it, just swarms and small removals close to the ground. (For a backup vacuum, I have a Craftsman vacuum exactly like the one in your video G3farms....Purchased at a garage sale last week for $1).
 
I can't really answer your question on the 1.5 hp vac, all I have ever used was the old craftsman I have. Give it a try and report back on if it works or not. I have found if you rub the top sliding board good with bees wax it will help with the seal and also sliding in and out.
 
.... Seems like people get along here. May make it my bee home. :)
It's much nicer that way. Some (very few) people seem to enjoy fighting but quickly, and politely get put into their place. Little by little they get won over to the positive way of doing things.
Glad you're with us on the positive side of things. :yahoo:
 
Thank you for all the welcomes and encouragement, I'll try to fit in here and be a help when I can. My friends all know that my opinion is just a breath away ;)
Apologies for hijacking your thread Blueblood, your pictures have helped a lot. :)
 
Discussion starter · #25 ·
No worries, thoughts on modifications are welcome...that's how we sharpen human ingenuity. I actually built mine by watching G3's video. I paused him several times and guessed measurements by sight and proportion of his hand to the sections when he pulled them apart.

My recent modifications: I placed window seal on two more locations, the bottom of the screen shim and the top of the ramp box (improved suction greatly). My second modification was to use a screen from a screened bottom board because it has metal trim around all sides. You can buy them without the whole board from Walter T. Kelley. I had a fit using just a piece of #8 cloth. The ends would fray and bend making it difficult to slide in.

As for integrating the motor to the top, I would think that would mess with the suction. Would you still be able to reduce/increase the suction with that set up? My brain twisted in a knot thinking that through. I use a 5 hp and I am glad I have all 5 of them.
 
HAHA Dave you hit the nail on the head for the placement of the weather stripping and the use of Kelleys metal trimmed #8 screen (made this modification shortly after the video and it works out great). As a matter of fact I just bought a used spot welder to make these, also just found out that neighbor has a shear and break :wink:.
 
I have a motor I scavanged from a Hoover Porta Vac.
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It is a lot heavier than it looks and a pricy unit. I got mine from a garage sale. I know for a fact a bunch of these units will be going up for sale in the near future.

I removed the motor from the case. kept the switch connected but just flopping. and attempted to build a box to hold it all. problem is my first attempt resulted in a box that is to small and still to heavy. The motor alone is fairly heavy.

So I am still looking for ideas on just what sort of container to mount this motor to. I want something that will be easy to transfer bees from vac to hive.
 

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Discussion starter · #28 ·
Daniel, would a five gallon buck with lid provide a large enough diameter for the motor? Otherwise, I would make a box out of wood, however that would be heavy. The only other thing I could think of is an industrial cardboard drum with metal lid and rims but those would be hard to find. Industrial businesses use them for dry chemicals and such.
 
A 5 gal bucket is plenty large enough. the motor is approx the diameter of a small coffee can. After watching the video I am thinking of jsut going with a vac like this one and if I need to move the whole thing up to reach. do what they say in the video. hand the box from the ladder. In my case the motor will be on the box itself. Ya can't beat the vacing them straight into the hive with a stick.
 
...snip...So I am still looking for ideas on just what sort of container to mount this motor to. I want something that will be easy to transfer bees from vac to hive.
I had an idea which eliminates the sliding board and mounts the motor directly on the top (while keeping the best innovations of the RoboVac).

I'll be done with it tomorrow -pictures soon. Will start a build thread when I get my final pictures. Stay tuned, I may have some interesting tweaks to an already good design. :)
 
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