Yes, the legs are now braced. When I made the stands, I drilled a 3" hole in which the pipe legs snugly fit. I thought this would give enough support, but no. Last summer, hive #3 tilted forward. I realized there was a little bit of play and the weight of all the honey could actually cause the hive to fall over. I propped up the hive with a stake which you can see in the bottom left of this picture:
I did not know how I was going to put on the braces. Drilling through the pipes would be too difficult. I thought some sort of clamp would work. An online search uncovered several types of clamps that would work, but scaffolding clamps seemed best, albeit a bit expensive. I went to (ugh) Home Depot to see what they had. What they did not have were scaffolding clamps, but I did find 3/4"- conduit hanging clamps. These were perfect (the legs were made of conduit pipes).
I screwed the clamps onto the strips of wood and then put the clamps onto the pipes. It worked. I braced all four legs and discovered that there was still some play. So I added a diagonal brace from leg to frame, one on each side. This made the whole thing stable. A fresh coat of paint, removal of old Tanglefoot (with a surprising number of bees that had become stuck) and application of fresh, and ready to go.
Once again Maidi and I lifted the hives back onto the stands. All set for the 50 or more pounds of honey in each hive the bees will make this summer! (One can always hope.)
Today I checked to see how #2 was doing with its second box. I had noticed how heavy the box was when we had moved the hives. I looked only at a few frames at the side. There was lots of uncapped honey and the bees were building comb in a foundationless frame, so I figured they were happy with the added space. I put a second box on #1 & 2, as you may have noted in the topmost picture. I also put a single Apivar strip in the added top boxes. It seemed to make sense to do so.
I still don' know what I'm doing, but I can put on a good show.
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