Powerblanket BB05GV Bee Blanket Honey Heater, 5 gal Pail Heater with Cutout for Gate Valve, Charcoal Gray

So heres to a decent/even good product.I wish the version with spigot cut out came with an adjustable thermostat, however its not really necessary.This years crop started crystalizing almost immediately after harvest, so i purchased this to liquefy it up for bottling. Worked like a charm. First batch left on for 72 hrs and it worked like a charm. I didnt think to check accual temp of honey, however it wasnt to hot to the tongue 😁. My only problem was that it didnt do much with the bottom lets say 1" in the bucket.. it was liquefied but still gritty and opaque. Next bucket I left for a week what with the holidays and all... but once again I still ended up with my last 4 or jars gritty and opaque. Guess ill buy a fermentation warmer pad in the future...Another plus for this blanket is i also did a case of jars from a few years ago.. First i tried just placing them on blanket with no results.. but then after 3 days of nothing i decided to cover them with a towel, and voila, the next day they were clear and runny as harvest day...In conclusion, yes I would recommend this product for the hobbiest beek who doesnt have access to a heated honey house, or doesnt feel like spending the money on building a "cabinet" type warmer.

I'm just a small amateur beekeeper looking for a good way to warm my 5-gallon pails of honey safely and efficiently. So when I spotted the BeeBlanket on Amazon it looked like something that might work well for me.My order arrived quickly (thanks Amazon Prime) and after a quick inspection it was wrapped around a full pail for warming. After 24 hours my honey went from 62°F to a nice 104°F in a room with an ambient temperature of roughly 68°F throughout the process. Also, I placed my cold pail on a chunk of ridgid foam insulation to minimize heat transfer from the cold floor.Admittedly I haven't warmed a stone-cold pail of crystallized honey with it, that will be later. Warming and re-liquefying a 5-gallon pail of honey would be a multi-day project in my estimation. Slow and steady like the bees...So far I'm impressed with the BeeBlanket and it's working good for my purposes. 104° honey is easy to strain and bottle plus it's safe for the honey! Using a 120 watt insulated blanket seems efficient to me and it worked quite well. My Kill-A-Watt meter is currently monitoring the power consumption so I'll update this review later.PowerBlanket also offers a version of the BeeBlanket that has a cutout for a honey gate (BB05GV) so that's on my wishlist for the future.UPDATE: After running my BeeBlanket for a full 24 hours on a cool bucket of honey my Kill-A-Watt meter gave me a daily cost of 0.08/day for an operating cost. (Power rate here is 0.102/kh) Seems like that's a pretty reasonable way to warm 5 gallons of honey. I'm sold on this!

I had some thick honey that I harvested in the late winter from a hive whose bees died over the winter. It was in a 400 micron strainer in the top of the bucket, and it just wouldn't strain because it was too thick. I put on the Bee Blanket and set the bucket on a seed starting mat. It took more than a day to start softening up, so I moved the the Bee Blanket up higher on the bucket, even with the top and put another heating mat on top. That did it!Attaching the Bee Blanket around the bucket handle was a bit awkward and probably lost a lot of heat, but it worked. The cutout for the valve is a great asset, also.

Rarely will I write a product review. However, as a small level bee farmer I thought this may be helpful.This thing works! It liquefies honey in a bucket. However, it gets too hot. It says it heats to 100 degrees Fahrenheit (too hot for me), but it’s more like 115 degrees. If you don’t care about raw honey this won’t matter. I do.I suggest you get a temp controller where you can set the temperature and it will regulate the electrical current and thus the temperature. For me, this is 95 degrees or hive temperature. I set on 95, put a piece of foam insulation under the bucket, tin foil on top, and use a really big spoon for making mead or wine to stir it twice daily. Takes about 2-4 days but your honey is raw.I used a past review for jars. I put a towel down, place the blanket down flat. Put 12 jars on one side of it. Fold the bee blanket over the top and strap down. Put the other half of the towel over it to hold in the heat. Set the temp on my temp controller to 95 and let it go for 2-4 days and it works great.I like this product. Works great. But if you sell or want raw honey, you HAVE to use a temperature regulator.

Works great for decrystallizing honey. I like the 110 degree heat threshold that doesn’t degrade you honey like higher temps can.

I purchased this item to heat barrels of honey. We had another bee blanket that worked great. This item was totally different in regards to their numbers with it, 800W, 120V and it didn't work at all! It's possible that it may keep your honey warm after heating it up with something else but what would be the point of having to use two different things.Too much money for something that doesn't work well at all!!

I’ve had an older version of this blanket for just over 3 years. It stopped working, which is disappointing, but I ordered a new one to replace it. I selected the one with the gate valve option and I just received the regular. I’m hoping if I order again, I will receive one with gate valve and I can send this one back. These blankets are great for liquefying a 5 gallon bucket of crystallized, honey so we can jar it.