# plastic vs wax foundation



## schindal (Nov 23, 2014)

Hi, I am new to beekeping and am looking to start a few hives this spring. I have been researching foundation types and cannot make up my mind. I hear lots of good things about both plastic and wax foundations. The biggest downfall of wax i hear is it is not as durrable as the plastic and not as easy to maintain. I am thinking about getting all plastic frames. My worry is that i hear that the bees do not take to the plastic framse as wellas they do the wax. someone i talked with said that he uses both wax and plastic and the bees tend to draw from the wax first. my thaught is to just order all plastic foundation to start with for the ease of use. Any suggestions would be great!
Andy


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## izak (Nov 24, 2014)

Hi, I'm also new to beekeeping but I have been in it for one year. I have learned that plastic foundation lasts longer than wax.


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## AR Beekeeper (Sep 25, 2008)

Wooden frames that use the plastic foundation are best. If you start with one 10 frame box feed the new frames/foundations in one or two at a time. If there is not a strong flow on feed a thin syrup and continue until the foundations are drawn out. To properly draw comb you need a strong force of 7 to 15 day old adults, they are the wax workers. 

If you start with a 5 frame nuc, and you have a second 5 frame body, put the foundation in the upper box. Feed the nuc with a feed jar over the hole in the inner cover. Check the progress every 2 or 3 days and move frames with comb drawn to the sides and add the new foundations toward the middle. If the weather is warm, move one frame of brood to the center of the top box and have the new frames and foundation toward the sides. If the bees start to make bad comb correct it when you find it, don't wait to fix the bees mistakes. When the nectar flow begins you can stop feeding syrup, but be ready to feed again if the flow stops. Once bees stop drawing comb it is not easy to make them start again.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

AR Beekeeper said:


> Wooden frames that use the plastic foundation are best.


:thumbsup: I totally agree. I use black foundation in the brood boxes to make seeing eggs easier and white foundation in honey supers. 

I find the foundation in some of the plastic frames tends to bow in one direction. You then need to worry about placing the frames so all the bows are in one direction. Otherwise, the bees will build bridge comb between the foundation if bows go opposite directions. Also the top bar on the plastic frames is not solid as is the wood, making it more difficult to engage the Italian hive tool to pry frames a part.


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## Mountain Man (Aug 26, 2013)

I find they draw out wax foundation twice as fast and much more


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

Noob here, too, with one year of beekeeping.

We have just a few all plastic frames, a couple of those green plastic drone frames. They're easy to spot, and if you are cold-hearted enough to use drone brood as varroa bait (we are), I'd get one of these per hive, and a couple of spares for when you're making drone-sicles. The bees took a while to decide to draw these out, but they did finally. When they are done with drones, they'll store honey in them.

We started out with wood frames and plastic foundation for our medium honey frames, on the argument that this was the easy way to get set up and they stand up to a centrifuge extractor. Again, the bees were not in a big hurry to draw these out, but they got around to it when they needed the space.

We used deeps for our brood boxes (we started with nucs on deep frames). For those we went with wax foundation. We'd been told, for brood frames that don't go into an extractor, we could get away with pinning the foundation into frames using bobby pins, but we wound up with some wonky comb. If they put nectar in those on just one side you can expect them to slump. As the year progressed, we started using wire, and finally wire with grommets, to get a nice tight bed to hold the foundation straight. 

We found that painting plastic foundation with beeswax makes the bees pay attention to the frames. You may start to see some comb very quickly. So if you find yourself removing burr comb, bridge comb, and crazy comb, save it and melt it down to paint plastic foundation.

Bees, I find, will draw no comb before its time. You need young, well-fed bees, but even with everything right, all your fondest desires will not convince the bees to do something they just don't think is important right now.


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## trottet1 (Jul 18, 2013)

Why not try both out? I started with both to see which I like best. I do think they draw the wax out faster, however, I still use plastic in honey supers because it seems they can handle a spinner better. Which ever you choose, neither will be detrimental to your colonies.


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## Lburou (May 13, 2012)

AR Beekeeper said:


> Wooden frames that use the plastic foundation are best. If you start with one 10 frame box feed the new frames/foundations in one or two at a time. If there is not a strong flow on feed a thin syrup and continue until the foundations are drawn out. To properly draw comb you need a strong force of 7 to 15 day old adults, they are the wax workers.
> 
> If you start with a 5 frame nuc, and you have a second 5 frame body, put the foundation in the upper box. Feed the nuc with a feed jar over the hole in the inner cover. Check the progress every 2 or 3 days and move frames with comb drawn to the sides and add the new foundations toward the middle. If the weather is warm, move one frame of brood to the center of the top box and have the new frames and foundation toward the sides. If the bees start to make bad comb correct it when you find it, don't wait to fix the bees mistakes. When the nectar flow begins you can stop feeding syrup, but be ready to feed again if the flow stops. Once bees stop drawing comb it is not easy to make them start again.


More wisdom in this post than it seems at first reading. 

In my view, bees prefer their own comb without foundation first. After that, they prefer wax foundation to plastic foundation (be sure plastic foundation is coated with wax or its a problem). Many beekeepers prefer the plastic foundation in wooden frames because it suits our purposes better when we are in an extracting situation or when the bees are using the straightness of the foundation as a guide (less cross combs). I use wooden frames and wax coated plastic foundation.


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## burns375 (Jul 15, 2013)

AR Beekeeper said:


> Wooden frames that use the plastic foundation are best.


My opinion also... plastic over wax foundation mainly because of warpage issues and time consuming wiring to prevent warpage. I also don't like the full plastic frames. Never had a problem with them excepting plastic, although the bees do prefer wax over plastic but not by much to make a significant reason for me to change. 

You could make the argument that boxe overhead filled with only blank plastic may urge them to swarm vs wax due to their resistance to readily draw off of plastic. Although i've never any scientific study. If someone showed data i would believe it. During the flow, when space is need they will draw on just about anything.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

AR Beekeeper said:


> Wooden frames that use the plastic foundation are best.


+1

Avoid the all plastic frame/foundation combo aka PF-100 or PF-120


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## Hiwire (Oct 19, 2014)

I have seen the bees preference for wax over plastic first hand. So far I am using only wooden frames with wax foundation. Its a no brainer BUT so far I only have 23 hives. Its conceivable that when I have more, I will no longer want to cross wire the deeps. That is the only downfall of the wax I have found. My mediums are not cross wired and have never blown out in the extractor. If I have a choice, I will never go to plastic frames OR foundation. I will admit that the one nuc that wax moths got in to required new foundation on 3 frames 2 yrs ago. If they had been plastic it would have been easy to scrape and reuse them. I do also sell a few assembled hives and try to use only "high end" materials, not "commercial" to justify the prices I charge. For that, I feel like wooden frames and wax foundation is the real deal. Just the opinion of one more greenhorn.
Ray


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## Vance G (Jan 6, 2011)

I really like the all plastic frames. Mann Lakes PF series are well received by the bees if you leave them in the shipping container until placing them on the bees. This keeps the wax smell fresher. The same for pierce and acorn brands. My next choice is wooden frames with plastic wax covered foundations are well received by the bees. Wax foundation is very good but is fragile in the cold and is not beginner beekeeper friendly and foundationless is definitely not beginner friendly. Save those adventures for your second year after you have some good combs drawn on the more foolproof plastic foundations. If you want and need style points go the harder route. Good luck.


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## psfred (Jul 16, 2011)

Ask ten beekeepers a question, get eleven different answers.... (joke).

Seriously, both plastic and wax have their advantages. I use wax and crosswire everything, I really dislike warped comb and only have a few hives. Might not be worth the hassle if you are making thousands of frames a year.

At least around here, wax is better accepted by the bees and they will draw it when they won't use plastic. They also tend to draw comb perpendicular to the plastic foundation, or build a comb off the frames between the sheets, which is a pain. Not that they don't occasionally do strange things with wax foundation, but I have not seen a comb built that way with wax foundation except on a queen cage just installed in a package. Always get a little strange comb since the bees are building comb off the queen cage to start with, and will use wax from elsewhere to do it.

Wax warps if not crosswired, and vertically wired wax foundation warps a LOT if not crosswired. This is due to the fact that the vertical wires are fed off a roll, and while flat when it arrives, when it warms up in the hive the wires still have some curvature in them and bend the wax. Plastic is usually flat, but a friend of mine had a batch warp badly over the winter on him, so he got rid of it. 

Last year another friend had quite a supply of plastic foundation, so I built frames for it. I also lent him some wax foundation and a couple boxes because he was short and needed them. The bees drew the wax instantly and ignored the plastic until all the wax foundation was drawn and filled. No more plastic foundation for him, I think.

Try both -- the plastic is definitely easier to use and if your bees like it, lasts forever. Wax can be re-cycled easily enough and is likely to be drawn more quickly, but has to be crosswired for best results. If you strongly prefer one over the other, use only that one.

Some people really like plastic frames, others don't. My neighbor is going to get rid of hers, she really doesn't like them at all, compounded by the fact that the person she got the hives from spaced nine frames evenly in a ten frame box, making a huge mess we will have to sort out in the spring. I'm not looking forward to that, we only really got rid of the mess in the hive my brother tried that in when it died out and the wax moths got into it and we scrapped all the wax. I make all my own frames and boxes, at least so far, so plastic isn't an option. 

Peter


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## schindal (Nov 23, 2014)

Thanks everyone! A lot of great information here. I have been reading a lot on this sight and learning but this was my first post. There is TONS of stuff to Learn before starting in the spring and this web sight really helps!


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## dsegrest (May 15, 2014)

mgolden said:


> :thumbsup: I totally agree. I use black foundation in the brood boxes to make seeing eggs easier and white foundation in honey supers.
> 
> I find the foundation in some of the plastic frames tends to bow in one direction. You then need to worry about placing the frames so all the bows are in one direction. Otherwise, the bees will build bridge comb between the foundation if bows go opposite directions. Also the top bar on the plastic frames is not solid as is the wood, making it more difficult to engage the Italian hive tool to pry frames a part.


I use yellow plastic foundation in wood frames. It is coated with wax and the bees draw it well. I have never had a problem with bowing. The bees propolize the edge on the frames and make it really strong. It is much better for uncapping and extracting than the wax.

In bee school, the instructors all praised wax and said plastic was no good. As I got to know the other beeks, I found that the best of them used plastic. One guy who is a Master Beekeeper even uses plastic comb.


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## mgolden (Oct 26, 2011)

dsegrest said:


> I use yellow plastic foundation in wood frames. It is coated with wax and the bees draw it well. I have never had a problem with bowing. The bees propolize the edge on the frames and make it really strong. It is much better for uncapping and extracting than the wax.
> 
> In bee school, the instructors all praised wax and said plastic was no good. As I got to know the other beeks, I found that the best of them used plastic. One guy who is a Master Beekeeper even uses plastic comb.


The bowing problems were with the Pierco one piece plastic frame c/w plastic foundation. Will not be buying any more any time soon. All recent purchases are wood frames and plastic foundation.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

psfred said:


> Try both -- the plastic is definitely easier to use and if your bees like it, lasts forever.


I agree. Its not a bad idea when starting out to try a couple of alternatives. However, I strongly suggest that you not intermix plastic foundation with wax foundation in the same hive when starting from zero. Its been my experience that bees will go to the wax foundation first, which can lead to issues when plastic is present. Does that imply that wax is better, well not really. If a colony is only given waxed coated plastic foundation they will draw it out very well, with a nice natural progression from the middle of the hive outward. If you intermix wax & plastic you can see that they may skip the plastic and move to the next wax foundation frame. This generally leads to mis-drawn comb, as bee-space will likely get violated. Also in this scenario, if there isn't a good flow, the bees may remove the wax on the plastic to build up the wax foundation. This compounds the problem because once the wax is removed the bees will be very reluctant to work the plastic. I think this may explain why some feel so strongly against plastic. This applies only to when you're first getting the foundation built out. Once you have drawn comb, inserting other types of frames in between correctly drawn comb is far less of an issue.

I think what you'll find is that either foundation works well. Plastic foundation is pretty bulletproof, and wax may have a slightly better acceptance. However, there are techniques, as I suggested above, that if followed will give you a better chance at getting well-drawn comb the first time. Of course, the biggest key when drawing comb is a good steady flow (natural or artificial).


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## labradorfarms (Dec 11, 2013)

In my first year. I purchased plastic foundation for my hive...... Which I might ad I never used and is still in my shop untouched...

I was scared from all I read that the Bee's were very slow to draw it out. So I reordered wax foundation. And used that....

I may try a frame or two this coming spring.... Im not sure yet..


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## Cyathea (Nov 4, 2009)

When I'm working the hives I do find the wooden frames are glued down a lot tighter than the plastic, so take longer to sort out, not really an issue when you only have a couple of hives, but commercially it does make a difference.


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## johng (Nov 24, 2009)

I like the black plastic with wood frames in the brood box and crimped wire for the supers (6 5/8). The reason I stuck with this set up is the black makes seeing eggs easier. I also like the plastic in the brood frames because I have found it harder to keep wax moths out of stored brood frames. So if they get into the frames I can just scrape off the wax and start over. Since I don't have as much trouble keeping the moths out of good clean super frames I go with the wax because the bees do seem to draw it out just a little easier than plastic. I also don't like wiring frames if I was to use deep wax foundation I would probably have to start wiring frames. I find the crimped wire more than sufficient for the medium frames without cross wiring. 

On a side note I despise the all plastic frames. The bees build lots of bur comb in between the boxes because they are slightly smaller than the top bar on a wooden frame which makes breaking the boxes apart quite a challenge sometimes. The end bars are also bad about breaking off if the frame is heavy with honey and your not careful about dropping it back into the box. I don't have time to be gentle every time I put a frame back in. I also hate throwing away a perfectly drawn out deep frame too. That's been my experience.


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## AstroBee (Jan 3, 2003)

johng said:


> On a side note I despise the all plastic frames. The bees build lots of bur comb in between the boxes because they are slightly smaller than the top bar on a wooden frame which makes breaking the boxes apart quite a challenge sometimes. The end bars are also bad about breaking off if the frame is heavy with honey and your not careful about dropping it back into the box. I don't have time to be gentle every time I put a frame back in. I also hate throwing away a perfectly drawn out deep frame too. That's been my experience.


Couldn't agree more. Exactly the same experiences that I've had. Unfortunately I bought into the PF garbage 10+ years ago and still have lots in my operation, but as they fail I'm moving everything to wooden frame with plastic foundation, which is a far more robust setup.


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## spunky (Nov 14, 2006)

Plastic with wood for me -


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## Vance G (Jan 6, 2011)

As Mr Bush is fond of saying, "Anything works if you give it time" Drawing foundation of any kind is best done during a strong honey flow by bees who are expanding their colony. Comb building also requires heat. If those conditions are met the bees will draw anything including unwaxed plastic.


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## 100 td (Apr 3, 2011)

I've recently changed (trialing) to one piece plastic frames/foundation, roll a coat of wax on with a paint roller and your done, and the bees build on it just like wax, as it is wax! (fully wax coated foundation)
No wiring, no assembly, no nailing, no gluing, spins in the extractor at full speed with no blowouts, no foundation to replace, EVER, but the plastics I'm using aren't as robust as wood/plastic, but are CHEAP! No labor except for the roll of wax, very quick.


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## My-smokepole (Apr 14, 2008)

Ya Wooster 4" roller is great for that. I have heard good thing about Acorn. Haven't tried them.


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## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

We've only used the Mann Lake PF-5xx series plastic frames to date, altho I bought a couple cases of PF-1xx to save a few bucks this last summer. I've read so much about how bees prefer 'anything but plastic', I did an experiment this summer to see just how much of a difference it makes.

Here is the experiment frame (PF-100 series) just before putting it in the hive:-


And here it is a few days later:-



I have many conclusions from this exercise. First and foremost, the plastic half was built out just as fast as the foundationless half, indeed a bit faster. Second thing I learned, I dislke the Mann Lake Pf-100 series frames compared to the PF-500 series. The metal insert on the 5xx series does indeed make them considerably stronger.

As mentioned earlier in the thread, fresh frames strait out of the shipping box, that still have the wax smell do not deter the bees. But frames that have been sitting around for some time, and no longer have the sweet smell of wax need a little encouragment, and rolling on a little bit of wax does the trick for those. The mistake I made some time back, was stocking up enough frames for a couple years of expansion, so I had to deal with a lot of old frames that didn't have that smell anymore. I wont make that mistake again, moving forward, will only order enough frames for what I need.


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## izak (Nov 24, 2014)

I use plastic foundation with wax coating and they are fine with it.


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

Grozzie, I think you deserve some kind of prize for that post. 

First, you did a real experiment with results we can look right at and see. 

Second, the tip about fresh (I think you mean wax-coated foundation) is one I've not seen anywhere else before. And it makes sense ... I love the smell of new foundation right out of a fresh package. Makes sense the bees would as well.


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## SWM (Nov 17, 2009)

I prefer wooden frames with coated plasticell foundation. Pure beeswax foundation is fine too with proper support in a wooden frame. Once it's drawn out, the foundation becomes irrelevant IMO. Getting good combs from any foundation requires either a good nectar flow or constant feeding...top off your feeders before they are empty! Without either, the bees will chew holes in pure beeswax and chew the coating off the plastic. In either case you will end up with combs that will need to be culled later.


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## Ravenseye (Apr 2, 2006)

As many stated, it's a matter of personal preference. I started with plastic and switched to wood / wax. I really don't like plastic anything so I'm biased against it. I just hate the thought of plastic getting dumped somewhere or having to be recycled into plastic again. From time to time I still end up with plastic frames (from nucs that I buy) and I eventually rotate them out. I have found that it takes bees longer to work plastic than it does wax. 

All that said, there are millions of plastic frames in use so I don't think there's a definite right and wrong. I enjoy building wooden frames and working with wax foundation. I like the smell of it and the feel of it so it works for me. Anything that makes what we do more enjoyable is a good thing.


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## Shutrbug (Feb 8, 2015)

Vance G said:


> Wax foundation is very good but is fragile in the cold and is not beginner beekeeper friendly and foundationless is definitely not beginner friendly. Save those adventures for your second year after you have some good combs drawn on the more foolproof plastic foundations. If you want and need style points go the harder route. Good luck.


This is the best bit of advice in this thread! I can see all of the good points about both sides of the issue... but the best way for a beginner may not be the best way for someone with experience under their belt. I want to make the right choice, but I can certainly make changes after this first season. I appreciate this.


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