Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 36.
A steam extractor
As you will see, you just need to place the old frames or the wax into the upper basket,
close up, light up and wait for the wax to come pouring out. Make sure, however, that
the container receiving the wax is pliable and large enough to hold a decent-sized block
and, as soon as this is full, replace it with another one. You will need several of these
containers on a good rendering day.
Boiling water
An even simpler way to render down old combs is to put them in a clean sack and
then plunge this into a container of boiling water. As the sack boils away, press it down
with a block and the molten wax will escape and rise to the surface. A spout near the
container's top will enable you to pour the molten wax into a collection tray. In fact,
because the spout on my container often blocked or because something else would
stop the flow of wax, I usually just collected the wax as a cake at the top of the tank.
Eventually I did away with the spout altogether. Because the cake was a large, circular
lump of wax, I rendered it down in a solar extractor into smaller cakes that were easier
to handle.
