Rendering and cleaning beeswax

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Three kinds of wax, kept apart

Not all wax is equal. Cappings cut off at extraction give the best wax there is, light in colour. Light coloured broken comb comes next. Old black brood comb gives the least wax, and the worst. 1

So keep them apart from the start. The National Bee Unit splits it into two piles: clean looking wax from supers and little used brood frames, and dirty looking wax from old brood frames. 2 The clean pile is the one worth making into blocks.

Never from a colony with foulbrood

This is the rule that matters most. American and European foulbrood can both be carried in wax, as well as in honey and pollen. 3

Melting the wax does not make it safe. American foulbrood spores resist extremes of temperature, and can still germinate after many decades in old combs kept in store. 3

Frames from a colony with European foulbrood must be destroyed, because the wax may carry the bacteria. A colony with American foulbrood is destroyed with its frames and its wax. 3

If you suspect foulbrood, render nothing from that colony. Contact the National Bee Unit, move no bees or equipment, and wait for the inspector. 3 Reporting varroa and foulbrood has the contacts.

Chalkbrood spores travel in wax too, and can last fifteen years. 3

Wash and soak it first

Wash every piece first, to get the honey and the debris off. Old brood comb comes cleaner if it soaks in water for several hours, or for up to two days. 1

Soft water is best. Rainwater beats tap water, because lime from hard water does nothing for the wax. 5 If hard water is all you have, the FAO adds vinegar at 0.1%, which is a millilitre to a litre. 1

The solar wax extractor

The easiest way there is. A solar extractor is a wooden box with a double glazed lid and a sloping stainless steel tray inside. The wax melts in the sun and runs through a strainer at the low end into a dish below. 5

Put the scraps in old nylon tights first. The dross stays in the tights and the wax comes out cleaner. 5 It makes large blocks, clean enough to exchange for new foundation. 5

It needs sunshine, so from the autumn the pan does the work.

In a pan of water

Wax is always melted in water or over water, never straight in a dry pan. Heated on its own, or above 85 °C, it discolours. 1

1. Keep a pan for wax only. Not iron, copper or plain steel, which the FAO warns will discolour it. 1
2. Put the wax in with plenty of water.
3. Heat it gently until the wax has melted. Wax melts between 60 and 65 °C. 4 Do not let it boil, and do not leave it. 2
4. Wear heat resistant gloves and eye protection the whole time. 2
5. Take it off the heat and let it cool. The wax floats and sets as a cake on top, and most of the dirt sinks. 5
6. Lift the cake out and scrape the dirt off its underside. 5

A second melt for clean blocks

For wax good enough to sell or show, melt the cake again in a bain marie, a pan standing in a pan of water. Do not let the water in the lower pan reach the boil. 5

Then pour it into a mould through a strainer with a piece of tights stretched across it. 5

If it catches fire

Hot wax is a fire hazard as well as a burn risk. 2 Heated wax can give off vapour that burns, and water must never go on a wax fire. 6

A burning pan of wax is a pan fire, and the fire service advice for a pan fire is short:

• Do not tackle it yourself, and do not move the pan.
• Never throw water over it. It can make a fireball.
• Turn off the heat, but only if it is safe to.
• Leave the room, close the door, warn others and call 999. 7

The way to never need that list: water in the pan, a low heat, and someone standing by it.

What is left over

Once it is rendered, dirty wax can be disposed of and clean wax used again. 2 The FAO notes that the residue from rendering makes good compost. 1 Only compost residue from colonies you know are healthy.

Never put dirty frames or wax out with the household waste, because whatever is in them goes into the environment. Spent frames and old comb are most easily burned. 2 Wax moth, and which frames are worth saving covers getting the frames back.

Storing the blocks

Keep wax somewhere cool and dry, and never in the same room as any pesticide. Clean wax in large blocks is not attacked by wax moth. 1

A white dust on an old block is not mould. It is tiny wax crystals, and the change reverses without harm. 1

Swapping it, or making things with it

Clean blocks can go back to a foundation maker in exchange for new foundation. 5

Making lip balm or hand cream to sell is a different matter. In law it is a cosmetic: the definition covers anything put on the skin or the lips to protect it or keep it in good condition. 8

Before a cosmetic is sold, or even given away as a free sample, a qualified safety assessor has to check it is safe. A responsible person with a UK address has to stand behind it and notify it to the Office for Product Safety and Standards. The label has its own rules too. 9

The short version

• Keep cappings and light comb apart from old brood comb.
• Never render wax from a colony with foulbrood. The spores survive the heat.
• Always in water, never in a dry pan, and never above 85 °C.
• Do not let it boil, do not leave it, and wear gloves and eye protection.
• Rainwater if you can. With hard water, a millilitre of vinegar to a litre.
• Scrape the dirt off the bottom of the cake, then melt it again over water for clean blocks.
• No water on a wax fire.