# Mann Lake pre-assembled deep frames



## Dan83 (Jun 23, 2013)

I ordered pre-assembled frames this year to save time. I had a pallet of deeps left and was hoping to slap a bit of extra wax on them and drop them in the boxes. Whoever assembled them went glue happy and made a big mess. Nearly every bundle of frames were glued together. 20 frames all stuck together as one. Simply prying them apart was tearing the frames to shreds. We had a learning curve as to how to get them apart without destroying each frame. We managed to glue the damaged ones back together and all frames are usable. But what a headache. It would have taken less time just to assemble them ourselves. I still have to go back and finish 5 more bundles. Has anyone else experienced this? I've had them stick together before but not like this. Makes me sick at the extra expense of ordering pre-assembled just to get this nonsense. Rant over, I feel a little better now.


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## rwlaw (May 4, 2009)

They must've did a 180 from last year, had a gal get a hive setup from them and i helped her do a insp, The frames were barely propolized and were coming apart. Looked like they put applied the glue with a toothpick.


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## mathesonequip (Jul 9, 2012)

call mann-lake and explain the situation. I expect that they will help you.


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## Flyer Jim (Apr 22, 2004)

rwlaw said:


> They must've did a 180 from last year, had a gal get a hive setup from them and i helped her do a insp, The frames were barely propolized and were coming apart. Looked like they put applied the glue with a toothpick.



Same here, I got 3000 deep frames last year no glue or wax.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

Oh the wonders of a machine that does the "automatic" assembly while the QC people are either asleep, ill trained , or just don't give a rip.

Unfortunately the robotics needed to apply the right quantity of glue to the right location on a frame just does not seem to have been developed where this conversation is about ancient history.

Until that changes your only viable option is to go acquire yourself a jig, spray bottle, glue jug, and a nice stapler and build them to last. We used to buy these pieces of junk but the long term goal of having the equipment last like it should could only be achieved through a do it yourself assembly line. Slow.. Yes... But they sure to hold together.


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## Dan83 (Jun 23, 2013)

mathesonequip said:


> call mann-lake and explain the situation. I expect that they will help you.


I thought about emailing them with pictures and the info from the "inspected by" sticker. All the frames are usable, so there's nothing for them to replace. The time and labor involved with this boondoggle is irreplaceable I have learned my lesson and will just suck it up and assemble frames myself from now on. Possibly from another source until the bitter taste is gone.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

Unless someone has come up with a better assembly machine in the last year you might as well forget about the "other" company option. I have tried them all. Either the glue, wood, or staples are an issue in one version or another. Good luck!


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## Flyer Jim (Apr 22, 2004)

I did see some frames from Shastina that looked good,got 2000 ordered,we'll see.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Dan83 said:


> I ordered pre-assembled frames this year to save time. I had a pallet of deeps left and was hoping to slap a bit of extra wax on them and drop them in the boxes. Whoever assembled them went glue happy and made a big mess. Nearly every bundle of frames were glued together. 20 frames all stuck together as one. Simply prying them apart was tearing the frames to shreds. We had a learning curve as to how to get them apart without destroying each frame. We managed to glue the damaged ones back together and all frames are usable. But what a headache. It would have taken less time just to assemble them ourselves. I still have to go back and finish 5 more bundles. Has anyone else experienced this? I've had them stick together before but not like this. Makes me sick at the extra expense of ordering pre-assembled just to get this nonsense. Rant over, I feel a little better now.


...and the great irony is that you did this to save time. At least yours had glue, I won't upstage you with a rant of my own. Trust someone else to assemble your frames at your own risk.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

Dan83 said:


> I had a pallet of deeps left and was hoping to slap a bit of extra wax on them and drop them in the boxes.


I'm not sure I understand exactly. Did you have multiple pallets and just the last one was glued up or did you only have one pallet. I've been using these for a few years. I find occasional frames glued together but never a whole bundle, much less an entire pallet. I have two new pallets in the barn I haven't opened....and now I'm wondering.
PS I've also gotten them without glue...or so little that it didn't matter....usually only a bundle or two. It is hit and miss in my limited experience.


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## Dan83 (Jun 23, 2013)

beemandan said:


> I'm not sure I understand exactly. Did you have multiple pallets and just the last one was glued up or did you only have one pallet. I've been using these for a few years. I find occasional frames glued together but never a whole bundle, much less an entire pallet. I have two new pallets in the barn I haven't opened....and now I'm wondering.
> PS I've also gotten them without glue...or so little that it didn't matter....usually only a bundle or two. It is hit and miss in my limited experience.


I had 1000 frames total, on two pallets. The deeps were on one pallet and the mediums were on the other. The mediums weren't stuck together, I could tell there was little glue. Nearly all the bundles of deeps were stuck together. A handful were ok. It seems like the little bit of glue completely missed its target and ended up down the sides, right where they contact the next frame. "glue happy" was misleading, as there was really no excess. Just in the wrong places. I'm over it now, off to the next problem.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

Flyer Jim said:


> I did see some frames from Shastina that looked good,got 2000 ordered,we'll see.


I did speak with the big wigs at Shastina about the need for them to jump into this section of the business after I had some poor results with the big two. 

SInce they acquired that business from Miller they have cleaned it up to the tune of 100%. Wish them all the best if they can do it. PM me when you get those frames as I would love an answer from a purchaser.

As a side note I did chat with them about the design they had on their sidebars on the new frames. The samples they sent me were designed where the job of "pass by" when pushing frames in a tight hive would be pretty difficult unless they redesigned the transition shoulders...


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## Mike Gillmore (Feb 25, 2006)

Dan83 said:


> I thought about emailing them with pictures and the info from the "inspected by" sticker.


That would have been my first step right from the start. Not every company has 100% model employees, I'm reminded of that every time I shop at a certain big box stores. 

I understand the frustration and need to vent, but you never know what their response would have been to correct the problem, if they had been given the opportunity.


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## loggermike (Jul 23, 2000)

I was hoping the Mann Lake ones would not have the issues the Dadant ones had.Thanks for the tip off. I will not bother.No more pre-assembled(meaning not enough glue and staples way too short) for me!

Oh and while I like the Mann Lake frames I put together, the Pierco foundation fell out of it, because Mann Lake uses a thin top bar.Not happy with pierco after they said it would work in Mann Lake frames.Buyers beware. (I did find a fix for it).


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## ordy28 (Sep 10, 2013)

Mike Gillmore said:


> That would have been my first step right from the start. Not every company has 100% model employees, I'm reminded of that every time I shop at a certain big box stores.
> 
> I understand the frustration and need to vent, but you never know what their response would have been to correct the problem, if they had been given the opportunity.


Exactly. They most likely would have corrected the problem. I've had great results from their customer service and fixing orders. Coming on here without first talking to them never gave them a chance and created folks that are thinking that they won't get a good product or that problems won't be corrected. See post above this one.....


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Some problems are easily remedied others arent even discovered until long after the fact. In the case of the op, the problem was obvious at the time he began using them and the good part is that once separated the frames were pretty sound. But lets just say (not that it has happened to me of course ) that you had already dispersed some 5,000 frames into well over 1,000 boxes before wide spread joint failure became obvious when you began taking the boxes off a month later as full frames of foundation begin falling out as you take the boxes off? IF that happened it sure would be a plague on your operation for many years. 
That is the whole issue with poorly constructed frames. You may not even realize you have a problem until its far too late to do anything about it. Build them yourself and you have no one to blame but yourself.


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## Mike Gillmore (Feb 25, 2006)

jim lyon said:


> Build them yourself and you have no one to blame but yourself.


That would be my recommendation as well. 

But back to my earlier point. If someone who experienced problems with the assembled frames never contacted the supplier to complain or report the issues, how would they know that they even have a problem. A call reporting defective equipment would be much appreciated from a business standpoint. It's likely they may have already lost that customer, but at least it could prevent losing others after the source of the problem was addressed. If they do nothing to correct the problem, that's another story.


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## Dan83 (Jun 23, 2013)

Mike Gillmore said:


> That would be my recommendation as well.
> 
> But back to my earlier point. If someone who experienced problems with the assembled frames never contacted the supplier to complain or report the issues, how would they know that they even have a problem. A call reporting defective equipment would be much appreciated from a business standpoint. It's likely they may have already lost that customer, but at least it could prevent losing others after the source of the problem was addressed. If they do nothing to correct the problem, that's another story.


I agree, I did go ahead and send that email. And the last 5 bundles of 20 weren't bad at all. If anybody ever has any doubts about the effectiveness of a good wood glue, I will gladly tell my story.


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## 78-79fordman (Mar 23, 2014)

loggermike said:


> I was hoping the Mann Lake ones would not have the issues the Dadant ones had.Thanks for the tip off. I will not bother.No more pre-assembled(meaning not enough glue and staples way too short) for me!
> 
> Oh and while I like the Mann Lake frames I put together, the Pierco foundation fell out of it, because Mann Lake uses a thin top bar.Not happy with pierco after they said it would work in Mann Lake frames.Buyers beware. (I did find a fix for it).


Thats funny I use both mann lake frames and peirco foundation and have had no problem


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## loggermike (Jul 23, 2000)

No its not funny, It involved lots of extra time on a couple thousand frames.

The problem was that the foundation barely fit in the grooves.Some fell out immediately so we knew we had a problem . But we sent out the ones that seemed like they might stay in. First inspection showed a lot of those were now out of the top groove and being drawn. We had to remove EVERY single one of them and find a way to reinforce them back into the frame. I like both products but in our case at least they were NOT compatible.


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## Honey-4-All (Dec 19, 2008)

loggermike said:


> No its not funny, It involved lots of extra time on a couple thousand frames.
> 
> The problem was that the foundation barely fit in the grooves.Some fell out immediately so we knew we had a problem . But we sent out the ones that seemed like they might stay in. First inspection showed a lot of those were now out of the top groove and being drawn. We had to remove EVERY single one of them and find a way to reinforce them back into the frame. I like both products but in our case at least they were NOT compatible.


Come on now. Get a grip...We all know the bottom line comes before QC at the "WE KNOW BEST" company. We are not to talk about the "Autoframe" machine and the un-uniform junk it puts out. Kind of sad cause they finally got a grip on good wood and better cuts...


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

I always like trimming the wires in the wax foundation to get them to fit properly from ol ML, it's just so exciting. The best fun though is to find which boxes or maybe it's batches of frames that you can fit that 1 extra frame into a box.....


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

JRG13 said:


> I always like trimming the wires in the wax foundation to get them to fit properly from ol ML, it's just so exciting.


I've had much the same pleasure with some hundreds I got from Dadant. 
Also....I had countless frames from Brushy Mtn that any plastic foundation I tried simply fell out. I had the joy of brad nailing them in place. 
I removed the shrink wrap from the two pallets of new ML assembled frames today and spot checked the bundles for frames glued together. I didn't want to discover such a thing in April. All I checked were good.....thank goodness.


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## loggermike (Jul 23, 2000)

Sorry , my grip is slipping
Agree with the cuts and wood quality on Mann Lake frames. But that top bar is thinner than any frame I ever used.


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## Flyer Jim (Apr 22, 2004)

Just got my 2000 frames from Shastina. They look very good no complaints.  Now to get them drawn and filled with honey.


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## flyin-lowe (May 15, 2014)

Flyer Jim said:


> Just got my 2000 frames from Shastina. They look very good no complaints.  Now to get them drawn and filled with honey.


I wont be ordering that quantity but are their prices comparable? Their website does not show any prices. Just curios, thanks


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