Today was a follow-on from activity during the last two weeks at my workshop where we've been making the frame and components for the sluice gate. Not to be confused with the weir at the dam outlet which will control the outflow of water; this will be placed just downstream of the top end of the launder and it must prevent any water from continuing down the mill stream. It must back the water up and raise the level by 1.1 metres for it to flow into the top end of the launder.

Hello all,
At last, the metal trough of the launder is finished! Last time I was down, two weeks ago, I realised the planks for the second side were too short to reach the end. Luckily I still had a short piece of the same Oregon, so I prepared a piece at home, and at work we made another steel joining strip. The first job, then, was to drill the holes after aligning the planks:

Heritage - News

Update for 29th September 2008

Hello all,
With no milling, only one visitor and fine weather, I have quite a bit of progress to show for the day! However, the end of the launder is still a little way off! I started with the launder looking like this:

Today I had a request for a batch of meal for a forthcoming Beaumont wine-tasting Dinner. In the menu the whole-wheat meal is generally cooked in several different ways. I did two batches, and also did some sums to calculate the losses between dry grain and meal.

The scale is quite rickety, but a bucket and its contents weighed in at 18lbs. The empty bucket was 2.2 lbs, leaving 15.8 lbs. I milled two of these: 31.6 lb which is 14.36 kg. In the end I had 13 kg of sifted meal and about ½ kg of bran that wouldn't go through the sieve. What I haven't added in is the water, which I spray on to the grain to bring it up from 10 or 13 % moisture content to about 18%. The rest? Into the air as fine cake flour. I'd like to think of a way of catching it! If we make the weave of the meal bag tighter, then the cake flour escapes at every crack or gap in the mill.

I had some visitors, a couple while I was milling, who were very interested. The day was beautiful, yet there was still a reminder of the cold weather we've had recently:

Heritage - News

Update for 18th August 2008

Launder More on Second side

Last week, I didn't send a report as there wasn't much spectacular to show for the day. I had several batches of visitors for whom I always down-tools and show them around. However, I did cut off the ends square on the second set of planks for the outer edge of the launder, drilled out the steel joining plates, clamped them over the joins, lined them up, drilled and marked the joins with a serial number for assembly in the right order, as I did for the first side. I then painted the wood-side of the metal joining plates and then the planks got a second coat on the side that'll be against the metal so I can't get at them again. I then actually attached the metal plates to one end of each of the planks and screwed in the bolts a little way at the other end. This will all make it easier during assembly, mostly at the top of scaffolding.

Heritage - News

Update for 12th August 2008

Hello all,

Last week I didn't send a report, as I got so little done. Mostly, it was because of visitors, always fun and interesting. One was from a local newspaper; let's see what comes of that! I also milled two batches of grain so we have stock of meal for a while.

Today, I got stuck in with noisy work as soon as I arrived, deciding to tackle the wood for the rail on the other side of the launder. As before, this involved sawing lengthwise and running the quarter-round cutter on the router twice along what will be the top edge, which the metal will be wrapped over.

Heritage - News

Update for 3rd July 2008

Hello all,
It's been a while since I sent in a Mill report. The reason is that we've been busy at our Museum in Villiersdorp setting up, assembling and getting going the big Crossley engine we rescued just 13 months ago from Standard Roller Mills in Caledon:

Last Saturday was the Big Start up, and it ran beautifully for most of the day.

Heritage - News

Update for 22nd April 2008

I think I can now say the water wheel is fully restored! Painting inside and out wasn't as straightforward as I thought, besides, 48 buckets X 2 is a lot of painting. Also half the buckets had a lot of oak leaves stuck on previous paint and these had to be scraped off first. The inside of the buckets I did standing in the tailrace where we'd done the assembling, the outside I did at the top, sitting on the support for the launder, painting one bucket, then pushing the wheel away with my feet, one bucket at a time. By the time I was nearly finished with this I was stretching my neck, hoping that I'd start seeing the freshly painted ones coming up. Eventually they did, then there were five to go then four, then three..... then they were all done!

Heritage - News

Update for 25th March 2008

Stephen Sokolic came and helped today with the making and fitting of more buckets to the water wheel. When we were carrying out the un-bent sheets, he asked how many to bring. I thought 12 would be a good idea, based on what I'd managed to do on my own on the prebvious two Saturdays. I had an idea Stephen was eyeing the pile of un-bent ones during the day as we progressed, and they didn't seem to be getting any less. The reason was, while he wasn't watching, I was adding more to the stack!

Heritage - News

Update for 26th January 2008

Another busy day in preparation for the Open Days next weekend!

First some tidying and organising inside. I had brought some laminated sheets, instructions for the bread machine, explanation of the crest on the Stamford Mill, lubrication of the wooden cogs with beeswax, etc, so those were put up along with several articles which have appeared in the press about our project: