THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



65 



blade to be as wide as may be and yet slip 

 readily into the sections. They may be cut 

 out of rather heavy sheet iron and should 

 have handles of wood. Provision must be 

 made to heat them. A gasoline stove is best 

 but any of several other ways will do. 



When ready to use it place the board of 

 blocks with the raised ends to your left on a 

 bench, and have plenty of sections and piles 

 of foundation cut before hand, each piece 

 flat, rigid with cold, and free from the others. 

 See that the "B" blocks are all drawn back. 

 Now take a "foundation" by opposite edges 

 with the thumb and finger of the left hand 

 and at the same time with the right hand 

 seize a section by the edge of the top piece, 

 adjust the foundation to the block even with 

 the back and sides (however at all events it 

 should extend about % in. beyond the front 

 end of "B") and as the section is coming 

 slip the fingers of the left hand through it on 

 to the foundation to hold it in place till the 

 section drops over it. In this way fill the 

 board. Now with an iron tvell heated in 

 your right hand, having the first and second 

 fingers of the left h nd on the foundation, 

 and the thumb and last two fingers on the 

 edges of the section, slip the iron inside the 

 top of the section, straighten the first and 

 second fingers of your left hand to push the 

 foundation on to the iron which, as soon as 

 the foundation touches, is to be quickly with- 

 drawn, but the foundation is kept moving 

 till pressed against the top of the section 

 where it will stay till heat melts it loose 

 again. I have used this device for several 

 years and I find it decidedly the best for the 

 purpose of anything with which I am ac- 

 quainted. With two or three more boards, 

 and sufficient help to put on and take off the 

 sections, an active person may fill 1,.500 sec- 

 tions per hour, and the foundation is fasten- 

 ed in such a manner as to leave nothing to be 

 desired in that respect. I follow a similar 

 plan in putting foundation into brood 

 frames. 



[Descriptions of mechanical contrivances 

 are sometimes quite difficult to understand. 

 One man may not understand one descrip- 

 tion, yet another description may be per- 

 fectly plain to him, while some other man 

 may better understand the other description. 

 Then, again, the reading of two descriptions, 

 as given by a different person, thus getting 

 a view from two different points, as it were, 

 often makes all plain. It is for these rea- 

 sons that I here introduce a description that 



I gave, in the July number of the Review for 

 1888, of this very same foundation fastener, 

 ft eling sure that both descriptions combined 

 with the illustrations will certainly make all 

 plain. — Ed.] 



" We spent the last day of June very pleas- 

 antly and profitably, in the company of Prof. 

 Cook and his nephew, at the home of R. L. 

 Taylor. Among other things, Mr. Taylor 

 showed us an arrangement of his for fasten- 

 ing foundation into sections. It works upon 

 the hot-iron-melted-wax plan. Attached to 

 the upper surface of a board, are perhaps 

 twenty little, nearly square, blocks of wood, 

 each exactly large enough for a section to 

 slip down over it and leave a % space at one 

 side. We may be getting a little ahead of 

 our story, but we may as well say, right here, 

 that when a section is placed over a block it 

 is so placed that the % space comes next to 

 the top bar. The upper surface of these 

 blocks is not level ; one side of each block 

 being perhaps half an inch higher than the 

 opposite side. Upon the upper surface of 

 each block is a little sliding platform J^ of 

 an inch in thickness and nearly as large as 

 the block. When one of these little platforms 

 is slid, it ' slides down hill ' upon the slant- 

 ing surface of the block underneath. To 

 keep these little platforms in place, a % 

 square strip of wood is tacked to the bottom 

 of each. Each strip of wood extends nearly 

 the whole width of a platform, and fits into 

 a corresponding groove cut in the block be- 

 neath. 



The work of fastening foundation into 

 sections is performed as follows : Upon each 

 of these platforms is placed a square piece 

 of foundation that will nearly fill a section. 

 After putting on apiece of foundation, a sec- 

 tion is slipped on over the block ; and the 

 height of the block and platform combined 

 is such at the lower edge that when the fingers 

 are placed upon the foundation, and the 

 foundation and platform ' slide down hill;' 

 the lower edge of the foundation comes in 

 contact with the center of the underside of 

 the top bar of the section. Before the sliding 

 operation is performed, however, a piece of 

 hot iron, shaped something like a broad, 

 thin chisel, or square-pointed trowel, is slip- 

 ped down between the top bar of the section 

 and the edge of the foundation; then the lat- 

 ter is pressed against the iron, and, as the 

 iron is quickly withdrawn, the melted edge of 

 the foundation is brought in contact with 

 the top bar of the section. By the time the 

 twentieth piece of foundation is fastened, 

 the operator can begin at No. 1, and remove 

 the sections in the same order that the foun- 

 dation was put in, placing them in the su- 

 pers. The irons for melting the edge of the 

 foundation are two in number, one being 

 heated over a gasoline stove while the other 

 is being used. Each iron is nearly % of an 

 inch thick, as wide as the inside of a section, 

 and furnished with a handle. To each iron 

 is also added, upon the back side, a stop that 

 strikes the edge of the top bar of the section, 

 thus preventing the iron from being pushed 

 down too far which would keep the wax in 



