874 
WAX 
it to the rendering of wax. He claimed 
it released all the wax and lots of dirt and 
coloring matter. The old combs in such 
an agitator are thoroly stirred and rubbed 
under hot water so that the wax is lib¬ 
erated, and rises to the surface, where it is 
drawn off thru a spout. As will be seen, 
this is somewhat similar to the plan shown 
in Fig. 2, before mentioned, altho it would- 
be of course a great improvement on that 
very crude method. 
From experiments and from reports re¬ 
ceived from hundreds of beekeepers, it 
would seem as tho the wax-press is by 
all means the most satisfactory wax-ex- 
tractor yet devised. It is doubtful whether 
anything' but pressure combined with hot 
water can remove all of the wax. There will 
Thoroly heat in boiling water the refuse 
to be tested, then allow it to cool slightly ; 
seize a large handful, and squeeze it as 
hard as possible in the fingers. If fine 
lines of wax appear in the creases between 
the fingers considerable wax is left—per¬ 
haps from five to ten per cent or more, 
depending upon the amount of wax shown. 
The hand will not be burped in the very 
short time necessary to make this test. 
But, as before stated, the most conclusive 
method of determining the waste is to run 
the refuse thru a well-constructed press. 
HOT-WATER WAX PRESSES. 
In hot-water presses the pressure mav be 
continued without the least danger of chill¬ 
ing the combs. The hot water has the- de- 
Fig. 5.—Hersliiser hot-water 
wax-press. 
Fig. 6.—Use of the lever in pressing wax. 
probably never be a wax-extractor of any 
kind that will economically remove the last 
particle of wax; but if the amount of waste 
can be reduced to less than one per cent, 
the loss is negligible. 
Before entering the discussion of wax- 
presses it may be well to add a word of 
caution to beekeepers who are sure that 
the particular method they are using 
enables them to obtain all the wax or prac¬ 
tically all. If the refuse, when the wax is 
finished, has not been put thru a well- 
constructed press there will be no way of 
determining the amount of waste, for it 
might contain as much as 20 per cent of 
wax and still look perfectly clean and 
show no traces of it when examined. On 
a small scale it is possible to get some idea 
of the amount of wax left in refuse by the 
following very simple plan: 
cided advantage in that the screw can be ■ 
raised after having been turned down, when 
the “cheese” can become saturated again 
with boiling water. The screw may then 
be lowered, and the hot water forced out 
of the refuse, carrying with it more of the 
wax. This operation must be repeated as 
often as found necessary by experience. 
It is thus seen that there is no disagree¬ 
able handling of the refuse until all the 
wax is out. Furthermore, the work, if 
necessary, may be- confined to the one tank. 
Orel L. Hershiser of Buffalo, N. Y., de¬ 
vised the hot-water press shown in Fig. 5. 
The capacity of this is large, so that it is 
possible to obtain as much as 75 pounds of 
wax in one day over a common stove. One 
great objection to hot-water presses here¬ 
tofore has been their relatively small capac¬ 
ity of wax per day. Mr. Hershiser, by 
