‘A Stitch in Time’ – Advice from the Honey Processing Experts

  ADVERTORIAL: CRYSTECHNZ     

Don’t wait, get onto your honey processing equipment repairs and maintenance now – that’s the advice from expert and CrystechNZ manager Jamie Grainger. There’s also a new piece of New Zealand designed equipment in their catalogue that will be much-needed by many a beekeeper, and the popular G-Force wax separator at a special price…

Jamie Grainger. The CrystechNZ manager and his team not only construct new honey processing equipment from their Tauranga base, but travel to install or consult on existing plant. 

It’s a bit of a bug-bear for Grainger, but every November and December he and his CrystechNZ team of engineers seem to get awfully busy bringing honey extraction and packing plants around the country up to speed.

“It’s just human nature, I guess, to put things off to the last minute, but it does make all those R and M jobs so much easier for the guys that get in early in winter,” Grainger says.

“Not only does it give us more time to come to the best fix, but all the issues and niggles from the honey processing season are fresh in their minds. That makes diagnosing the problem and coming up with the solution a lot easier. The more time the better.”

The Tauranga-based company have been providing honey processing equipment since 2013 and offer a wide catalogue, much of it manufactured on site. In recent years “consultancy” has been a major part of their offerings too, providing advice to beekeepers to maximise efficiency of their honey lines.

“With more second-hand trading of honey processing equipment taking place in recent years, we have been spending quite a bit of time helping make sure various pieces of equipment are installed correctly and working together smoothly,” Grainger says.

The former beekeeper often travels the country calling in on those whose honey plants are in need of improvements, taking pride in offering a service all the way from initial consultation, to full or partial-line installs, and then always being on call.

“The phone will often ring in the honey season and we are happy to do our best to fix things over the phone, or travel to sites when needed. However, if we can minimise the problems in season by getting onto repairs, maintenance and upgrades now, that’s a win for all.”

Kiwi Designed Frame Cleaner

There’s no doubt about it, coming up with efficient and effective ways to remove wax from ‘aged-out’ plastic frames so they can re-enter the hives is a major opportunity for Kiwi beekeepers to improve both their economic and environmental sustainability. Now the CrystechNZ catalogue includes automated and manual beehive frame cleaners which allow beekeeping businesses to bring the task in house.

Now’s the time to touch base with honey processing experts CrystechNZ, to review the past season and get a plan in place for any improvements while there is plenty of time to do so.

“It’s about time beekeepers had access to a reliable machine to undertake the task of frame cleaning, without having to freight their frames to far-off contract frame cleaners,” Grainger says.

“Honey Badger Industries in Whangarei invented a great machine with a simple but effective automated processing using dual waterjet multi-rotational cleaning heads to have frames with even the oldest, darkest wax coming out the other side clean. We were impressed and so, rather than reinventing the wheel, have agreed to add them to our offerings.”

The G-Force Centrifuge from CrystechNZ, with its ability to separate beeswax from up to 1000kg of honey an hour, is becoming more and more common a sight in honey extraction plants across the country.

It’s another of those jobs that can be done over winter, or early spring after dead-out hives are discovered. Therefore, Grainger encourages any beekeepers who are sick of landfilling aged-out plastic frames, laborious manual cleaning of them, or paying freight on using contract cleaners, to get in touch with CrystechNZ to find out more about the automated cleaner.

Get Serious About Honey Quality – G-Force Special

Improving the quality of the world’s best honey drives the CrystechNZ team and no piece of their equipment better exemplifies that than the G-Force Centrifuge Wax Separator.

“It is no secret that spending in the honey industry has been down in recent years, despite that our G-Force Centrifuge continues to be popular,” Grainger explains.

“It is a vast improvement over the ‘hummers’ used in many sheds around the country, both in throughput of honey and its quality out the other side.”

With a discount of 10% offered this month on all G-Force sales, it’s just more encouragement to put maintenance and upgrades inside the honey shed at the top of the list this winter.

“At least give us a call to check in with how your honey season went,” Grainger says, adding “it is amazing the improvements that can be made, even to existing plant, by talking it through when it is fresh in the mind.”