You should select a foundation according to the type of bottom bar and size of frames you have. Sheets of foundation are secured within the frame with either metal support pins, horizontal wires, and the wedge of the top bar, or with two v-shaped metal wedges. Vertically wired foundation has wire hooks on one side that fit over the wedge of the top bar. Undrawn foundations should be given to only rapidly growing colonies such as a package, swarm, or colony split or to established colonies during a major nectar flow. When foundation is given to colonies during a nectar dearth, the bees will often chew holes in the foundation.
Workers build combs as they add wax to the cell base imprints on the sheet of foundation.
Wax is produced by four pairs of glands on the underside of the worker's abdomen. As wax is secreted and exposed to the air, it hardens into flat wax scales. To produce comb, the bees remove the wax scales from the underside of the abdomen with spines located on the hind leg. Then they manipulate the beeswax with their jaws until it is ready to be formed into six-sided cells. The primary function of the queen excluder is to confine the queen, brood rearing, and pollen storage to the broodnest.