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:

Heritage - News

Update for 19th January 2008

The brief at the moment is to get the Mill ready for the Open Days in two weeks time. This includes making the most of the area of the water wheel itself. The invitation includes this image:

Heritage - News

5th January, updated 19th January / 26th January

Jump to the update;

• Update 19th January 2008
  Update 26th January 2008
  Update 25th March 2008
  Update 22nd April 2008

5th January 2008

Hello all,

Firstly I have to report on the passing of paterfamilias of Compagnes Drift, Raoul Beaumont in this last week. He had been gravely ill and in hospital for nearly two weeks and gave up the struggle on Thursday. In him I have lost my No 1 fan of these reports. He hung on every word I wrote, always saying how much he enjoyed reading them! His last year was buoyed by two things; one his Harley Davidson and getting well enough from a previous set-back to be able to drive it again. The other was progress on his mill. I am pleased that we had reached the milestone of finishing the planks on the water wheel in time!

Any collector and restorer of Stationary Engines is always on the look-out for unusual pieces of equipment to drive with his engines, so making them more interesting to the general public. It cannot be often that the occasion arises to drive a whole mill house! I have had this fortunate opportunity recently on the farm Compagnes Drift in Bot River, which dates back to 1750 and was an outpost of the Honourable Dutch East India Company (VOC). The farm, home to the Beaumont family, is situated about 100 km due East of Cape Town, and luckily only 23 km from Elgin where I live.

The farm gate post.