# Cut out from behind plaster walls



## Rader Sidetrack (Nov 30, 2011)

I suggest that you might want to find a good "stud sensor". I have one that also has a setting for identifying "hot" house wiring. (While it works pretty well and is a great tool, it still makes sense to turn off the power when cutting the wall.)

More here: http://www.zorotools.com/g/00059991...kw={keyword}&gclid=CImWodHJ9rwCFUdk7AodbU4ANg


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

A hole saw will let you investigate the size of hive. A thermal scan would let you know where the brood is, but that is probably overkill.
A sawzall with a medium or fine blade will make less of a mess than circular. Finer blade = more work, less mess. Depending on the plaster and how it is coated dampening with water for several hours down your cut line can cut down on the dust. If you cannot wet it, cut between tape. Wall paper can hold plaster together pretty well sometimes, you might even slap some on before hand.The really old method had a second plaster wall inside the studs.

Cut down the side of the studs and add doublers to patch the hole. Use a sheetrock hand saw to make your cross cuts. Start small and see if you can remove comb through cut.
Close off the room and put a box fan in the nearest window before you start. If painted, it is lead based until proven otherwise.

Doing a trap out before the removal might make the job easier inside.


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## RobWok (May 18, 2011)

At least you're picking the right time of year. The hive should be the smallest right now. The way I do it is to drill a couple holes to figure out where the studs are, then snap vertical lines with a chalk line after marking with a straight edge. Then, I take my hive tool or a wonder bar and lay it on the line and hammer down the length. Then, I take a hammer and break the plaster down until I can see the wood lathe. Then, it's a wood blade in my sawzall, and final removal of the lathe and plaster. I usually wall off the room with plastic floor to ceiling, and use a bee vac. Normally, you could drill several holes and stick a dowel in the hole. If there's honey, there's honeycomb, but at this time of year there won't be much. 

A thermal scan can be done with your bare hand, or the back of it. Slowly sweep back and forth. I use an infrared scanner but my hand works almost as well. Don't trust your ears. The buzzing seems to echo through the walls. The heat though will be minor unless there is brood. 

The problem with blades and plaster is that plast can dull a blade really fast. I usually like to clear the plaster away first before starting with a blade. When you go to put the wall back together, have your drywall handy, and I like to set the drywall flush or just a little lower than the sheetrock, then use a 5 minute setting type mixable drywall. I use self adhesive thin fiberglass tape. Most times you can't tell anything ever was done, other than the spot looks better. I have even been able to mimic textured plaster with the fast setting drywall compound and made it virtually undetectable.

Rob


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

As Rob says, knock the plaster off the lath with a hammer. You'll be able to see into the stud cavity between the lath and figure things out. Start small and enlarge as you go.


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

Sorry but I have to disagree. When I was young and foolish I took down many a plaster wall by knocking a hole and sliding a 2x4 in and popping the lath off. Now that I am old and foolish I never would repeat that method. I would even use a dust mask.(maybe)

When horse hair became harder to get it was common to add asbestos as a substitute. That maybe because of the easy availability in a shipyard town, maybe it was not done in your local. It is not hard to take the time to control dust, probably faster than cleaning up after a small job. Sawzall with a short blade, tipped at as steep an angle as you can, held tight against the wall to control bounce. HEPA bag in a shop vac chasing the cut is not a bad idea either.

Being neat in someone else's house never hurts your reputation.


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## AChabot (Sep 24, 2012)

Thank you very much folks some great advice here. I think, in order to control dust and mitigate the effects of dusty lead paint I will in fact try chipping away the plaster and then attacking the lath with a sawzall. It just seems like it will be the best way to determine where the boundaries/studs of the hive are, and produce the least mess. I think the windows in the room are, sadly, sealed. I will report back to let yall know how it went.


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

If it were me, a dust mask wouldn't be optional.


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

We all like pictures too.


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## jredburn (Feb 25, 2012)

When you do a removal from the inside, you will fill the house with bees. Warn the people not to enter the room. Seal the room as best you can and cover everything, even the floor. Bees poop -- a lot. Asbestos was used in a lot of places and it is nasty stuff, wear a resperator not a paper mask. The damage never heals.


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## Kenww (Apr 14, 2013)

An asbestos removal pro told me you should wet everything down. Of course you probably can't use much water in a finished room, but maybe a little might help.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

There will be bees inside, but when I've done this I was always surprised how few. It seems they still tend to fly outside instead. You will want to keep that room closed, of course. Cutouts are messy. A plastic drop cloth on the floor would be helpful, but keep in mind honey on plastic is very slippery...


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

jredburn said:


> Asbestos was used in a lot of places and it is nasty stuff, wear a resperator not a paper mask. The damage never heals.


Like other hot topics (CCD, GMO, etc.), the truth about asbestos is not always clear. Read up on it so the hype is removed and you know what you're dealing with.


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## D Semple (Jun 18, 2010)

Make sure the money is right. 


Don


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

I knew men who worked WW11 engine rooms where the dust was so thick you could not see across the room. Spent their whole lives in it without a problem. On the other hand, friends who died from working out of an office next to a shop where wire brushes were used to remove gaskets & repair valves. Friable seems to be the key, that and who you are. Respect the dust is all I am saying. Silica is pretty nasty stuff itself. As is lead. 
Personally, I knew more men who worked in the offices and shops that were radar mast height who died from brain tumors than those who died from asbestos.


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## Intheswamp (Jul 5, 2011)

AChabot, I just have a couple of thoughts here. I cut a colony out of a wall last summer. A "simple" cutout from between board sheeting and sheetrock. I used a temperature gun sensor from Harbor Freight to get the location of the brood cluster...fairly easy to pinpoint the high temp area through the wall...works better if the ambient temperature is below cluster temperature as you're looking for an increase in temp reading. Once I found the cluster I dropped down the wall a couple of feet and cut into it with one of those little oscillating cutters (again from HF)...only to find the comb extending further downward. So I cut another square out of the wall below the first one. As it turned out that comb went all the way from the top plate to the bottom plate of the wall...be prepared. 

Close all the doors leading out of the room that you're working in. Open any windows that you can being as the bees will seek the light. Cover the fixed windows with shades or whatever to keep a bunch of bees from beating their brains out trying to get through the glass (lots will still get around the blinds/shades), but having a big, lighted opening for them will help move them on out of the room.

Finding the studs... If the dryer vent is inline with where you think the bees are located pick a spot several inches directly above the vent and cut an exploratory hole to peer through...no guarantees, but there really shouldn't be a stud above the vent hole. The electrical receptacle *should* be inside of a box attached to a stud so you might can get some orientation from that...again, no guarantees. Another option is to take a drill and start drilling in the area that you're going to cut out...easy to tell when you drill through into empty space and when you don't...you could plot out the stud spacing with this.

Keep a bucket of water close by for washing hands...keep some towels close by.

I'm not sure about knocking the plaster off with a hammer...seems that banging on the side of a hive of bees might agitate them a bit. But...if it's worked for others... :scratch:

Be very careful with the dust...asbestos is nobody's friend. I have taped dryer vent hose tightly to the exhaust on my shopvac and hung the end of the hose out a window on occasion. There is lots of fine dust that gets through the shopvac filters. 

The oscillating tool would probably cause the least amount of dust but I'm not sure about cutting through the plaster and lathe. Checkout some of JP and Schawee's videos as I know that they deal with a lot of plaster and lathe down in south Louisiana. A sawzall might be the best. I think the circular saw is going to throw the dust harder/further than the sawzall or oscillating tool will, but I've never used a sawzall so I may be off base on that statement.

Give yourself plenty of time for the job...it will probably take longer than your imagine. 

Read and re-read Don's statement below about the money.

Read and re-read Don's statement...again.

I agree with Saltybee about the pictures. 

Don't forget breakfast. 

Have you done cutouts before?

Best wishes,
Ed


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## Kenww (Apr 14, 2013)

My aunt died from the kind of cancer you only get from asbestos. She apparently was exposed to itfrom her husband's clothes. He never had problems. He was an electrician. I'd take precautions for your self and the people who will be using the room after you are done.


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

Intheswamp said:


> I'm not sure about knocking the plaster off with a hammer...seems that banging on the side of a hive of bees might agitate them a bit. But...if it's worked for others... :scratch:


Just need to get through the plaster with the hammer claw and then you can peel the plaster off the wood lath. No pounding needed.



> I have taped dryer vent hose tightly to the exhaust on my shopvac and hung the end of the hose out a window on occasion. There is lots of fine dust that gets through the shopvac filters.


This is what I do. Use a shop vac with a hepa filter but also run a long section of hose to the outside from the exhaust port

An older house like this may still have some knob and tube wiring in it, so don't assume the electrical is all in protective pipe.


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## Intheswamp (Jul 5, 2011)

Barry said:


> <snip>
> An older house like this may still have some knob and tube wiring in it, so don't assume the electrical is all in protective pipe.


Absolutely. I'm not sure when electrical code specified the use of conduit to run eletrical wire in, but it is a relatively new requirement....'70s?....'80s.......'90s??? :kn: 

The house that I did the cutout in last year did not have conduit...I'd say it was a 1960's vintage house. Anybody know when the code requiring conduit installation came to be?

Ed


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

That's why I like to remove the plaster from the lath first before cutting into a wall of this vintage.


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## AChabot (Sep 24, 2012)

Once again some great advice and a lot of things to think about. I have done a handful of cutouts before, I am no expert but I have done them both from the inside and the outside, this is just the first time I'll have to do a very controlled demo of plaster walls from the inside. The price is right. Regarding asbestos, I started asking a couple of folks in the know after it was brought up yesterday and most round here seem to think it was all horsehair. It doesn't mean that's right, but no one has really expressed concern about asbestos in plaster here and the certainly work with it a lot in my town. If I peel the asbestos away as suggested by Barry and others, it should minimize the dust. Of course a mask, goggles, and drop clothes go without saying. I think I'll also spray the wall pretty good before hand to try and get it wet. Not sure how much good that will do but it's worth a shot.

I know where the hive is, more or less. Like I said I found the very bottom of it by looking under the floorboards. I assume to goes up to any cross-stud in the wall, I just have no idea if that stud would be at the ceiling, or closer to the window or whatever. That's why I'll start just chipping away before I bust the saw out and go through the lath. I am hoping that by doing that I can locate all the studs, as well as any electrical infrastructure. 

Here in Virginia we have had a very cold winter like many of you, and the bees in my managed hives only just started brooding up. I expect the hive to be low in population. I will try to open a window but like I said I think they're sealed. I'll just get the ones that congregate there periodically. Thanks to all of you once again for taking the time to answer my questions!


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## Rader Sidetrack (Nov 30, 2011)

I previously owned a house in Seattle that was built in 1943 as part of a large development (reportedly related to the nearby presence of Boeing). Those houses were built with "knob and tube" wiring. In 1993 I wanted to blow in insulation into the exterior walls and discovered the original wiring was still in use. Typically, one of the two bare conductors was in one stud cavity, and its partner wire was was in an _adjacent _stud cavity. The walls were lath and plaster.

I ended up rewiring the house before adding the insulation.


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## AChabot (Sep 24, 2012)

Hello all. I did the cutout today, it was more or less straightforward and I got paid so no complaints. Two things are worth mentioning in this follow-up: the walls were made out of concrete (yes! or at least some kind of very hard rock-like substance, I've never seen anything like it. It possibly went in in the 1920s, ten years after the house was built and the covered porch was walled in. It was covered wiith a thin plaster veneer and no lath) and I think the hive was queenless, although very populous. 

There was a stud running horizontally about three feet up the wall, that was the upper boundary, and as expected, the two vertical studs were the other boundaries. After pounding away the two inch thick rock, I used a small circular saw to cut away two boards and found the hive. There were 7 combs, about 30" long or so, I reckon. There were plenty of bees, a decent amount of pollen and honey, but curiously, no brood whatsoever. I used the vac at the very end, everything else I cut out by hand, throwing out a lot of old comb. I never saw the queen, and that combined with the total absence of brood (my managed hives all have at least a couple frames of brood) leads me to think they had lost her at some point. Kind of disappointing but oh well. 

I put the comb I cut out with all the bees in a small outyard. I figure if the queen did somehow get either cut out or sucked up without me seeing her, she's in there and all will be well. Otherwise, they'll find their way into queenright hive and one way or another all's well that ends well.


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

Sawzall would have been slow work. Thanks for the pictures. Too bad no brood.


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## fieldsofnaturalhoney (Feb 29, 2012)

Nice work & pictures. Must have been a queen in there somewhere, seems like a lot of bees for no your highness. Perhaps a newly mated one, or one who just began laying? No eggs or larvae? Nice job missing that orange line. Was it electricity? How long into cutting did you identify it was there?


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## AChabot (Sep 24, 2012)

No eggs or Larvae whatsoever. Today they are kind of acting like they're at 'home' in their new box and they are clustering together, maybe she is in there. 

That orange line is an electric wire that runs up to the socket pictured. I figured it was there from the beginning, the power was shut off at the breaker and by the third comb I could feel it 'tugging' as I pulled them out and by the fifth comb it was totally visible and I had to start cutting around it. A fun neat job. Just nervous about the queen because I pretty much always find her.


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## AChabot (Sep 24, 2012)

For anyone interested, I posted a much larger and nicer photoset (taken by a very talented photographer and not my cellphone!) on my beekeeping facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.606872439405691.1073741829.479967172096219&type=1 Anyone can view it, you don't need to be a member of facebook.


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

Not much stores in the comb I could see, maybe why queen was not laying. Expanded metal lathe behind the concrete?


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## Intheswamp (Jul 5, 2011)

Looks like some heavy duty work getting to the wood lathe!!! Good job, AChabot!!! Hope the queen turns up. I had a small swarm that I started into the winter with...went through the colony a couple of times (small population of bees) and did not see the queen. Went into them a couple of weeks ago figuring there wouldn't be much to them if they were even still alive...comb drawn out to the sides of the box, packed with honey, pollen, and brood!!! Don't give up, yet, she could just be laying low till better times! 

Ed


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## AChabot (Sep 24, 2012)

Hey thank you Intheswamp for the compliments. I also hope the queen turns up, Saltybee you may be right. Today they are acting like they are 'at home' so I'll crack open the hive in a week or so and see if I can't find her. I'll let yall know.


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## Saltybee (Feb 9, 2012)

You can always give them the brood test, if they do not start cells pretty safe bet Q is in there.


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