3D printing for beekeeping - part 1

“Here's one I prepared earlier”.

Readers of a certain age will recognise that sentence, usually delivered as a prelude to the unveiling of a perfect piece of craftwork — for example, a space station built from loo rolls and sticky-backed plastic — on Blue Peter. My subsequent attempt, and that of thousands of other children around the country, probably fell well short of those of the presenter, perhaps explaining why the sentence has remained more memorable than whatever was constructed.

Nevertheless, making 'stuff' has always been enjoyable, particularly where form and function are more important than style and finish.

Like DIY for beekeeping.

As I emphasise in my winter talk on the topic, “the bees don't care” … about beautiful woodworking joints, a high-polish finish, or anything else. All that matters is that the result is strong enough, fits, and has the correct bee space.

I started writing about DIY for beekeeping before I wrote about any other aspects of our hobby. I've still got and use — on a daily basis — the floors, roofs, crownboards and hive stands I built 15+ years ago.

Some designs have evolved in the intervening period, others are unchanged.

Some should be changed, but I've yet to get round to it, so it's probably not mission-critical.

I've saved hundreds of pounds by making things for my bees, although that's not the primary motivation. The challenge of designing and creating something useful, and the satisfaction gained by using it, are far more valuable.

You can make some things for less than they cost from the suppliers, and you can make many things better than those supplied commercially.

By better, I mean functionally better (they might not look so good, but remember “the bees don't care™️”).

Often you can make them cheaper and better.

DIY is also an excellent way to fill the bee-free winters we have in northerly latitudes, where the active season in a 'bad' year might only last ~4 months.

3D printing

This year I embarked on a new chapter in my bee-related DIY when I reluctantly purchased a 3D printer.

Why reluctantly?

3D printing was technology I was aware of, but singularly uninterested in.

Naively as it turned out, I couldn't see an application of the technology that was useful to me. When I stumbled onto 3D printing websites they were filled with users complaining of filament issues, drying and slicing parameters (what?) and temperamental printers.

Or, on the rare occasions things worked, they'd be proudly displaying their Dungeons and Dragons playing pieces, or fidget toys, or something equally trivial (to my mind, I'm sure it's important and relevant to the creator {{1}}).

All of which demonstrates my ignorance.

We had 3D printers at work, where the technical team would churn out little tube racks for the teaching lab … at 25 p each. When compared with the commercial offerings at £25 these made considerable economic sense, but the printers still seemed to sit idle a lot of the time … or broken, as the techs called it.

“We're waiting for a replacement hot end/extruder motor/purge wiper”. Whatever.

But that was a few years ago, and things change.

Now, 6 months (and ~600 hours of printing) after buying my printer, I'm a rabid convert to the technology.

I was reluctant because of the up-front costs and perceived problems with the printers.

I over-estimated both.

What I underestimated, by a huge margin, is how useful and enjoyable 3D printing has been for my beekeeping.

Useful because I've made stuff I could not have otherwise created, and enjoyable because I've had to learn something new from scratch, and had a lot of fun solving difficulties along the way.

'Every day is a school day', or in my case, kindergarten 😉.

This post is the first on this topic, providing a bit of background, some basic technical details, and a few examples of what's possible (along with comments on the functional advantages for your beekeeping). I'll provide an update in the future on some of the more advanced things I'm working on, or hoping to develop over the coming months.