If the Instructions look vague...

Get a second opinion before you start bashing nails in.

*sigh*, keen as mustard we took my newly built hive up to the Apiary over the weekend, intending to make the most of the weather and shook swarm my bees into the new hive. Upon removing the roof, Andy took one look inside and said "oh, so you're going with Top Bee Space then? Interesting approach but you do realise that all my gear is Bottom Bee Space?"

As you've probably guessed, I was intending to make a "standard", Bottom Bee Space, National Brood Chamber. In my defence I claim that the instructions were vague and I'd lined up the side panels on the chamber wrong, then used the recommended, judicious, amount of nails to put it together. In short it's not coming apart again any time soon.

After a period of head scratching I decided to use the Castellated Spacers, originally intended for use in the supers, turned upside down and nailed to the side panels to convert the Brood Chamber back to Bottom Bee Space. Naturally the pre-drilled holes intended for use when having them the right way up were in the wrong place and I then had to make new ones.

I'm not entirely convinced that 4 nails are sufficient or that the spacer used in this way will be strong enough to support the weight of the frames once they're full of brood and stores, so I may yet have just created more work for me later in the year, but I am at least back to having all my gear set up the same way.