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Technical descriptions of English windmills

ESSEX P-TERLING

PELDON

Post mill, gone

TM007158

The mill last worked on four double-shuttered anti-clockwise sails; rear striking gear is absent from internal photographs, so any in use must have been inside the mill as at Aythorpe Roding. There were three pairs of 4ft burrs. A six-bladed fantail turned over the rear steps, whose stringers entered the mill body at lintel height on either side of the stable-type door, recalling the construction at Birch Green.

PURLEIGH, Raven’s Mill

Smock mill, gone

TL834022

{Mill built 1778}. Dr Turner went over the derelict mill c1920 and recorded three pairs of stones. The structure was pulled down in 1929 and the massive upright shaft is a well-remembered feature from that occasion, and is seen in photographs of the wreckage. From this it would seem that the stones were overdriven. The shaft appears to be about 15ft long and rounded off between three solid wooden squares for the accommodation of the wallower, a wooden face gear for auxiliary drive, and the clasp-arm great spur wheel. One questions whether the shaft was of 1778 vintage, as it was not prepared for compass-arm wheels which were generally employed at that time. Photographs of the standing derelict show it without sails, but it is known that the mill had four patents, for Baker of Danbury did some work on the striking rod in 1883, and subsequently fitted a new cross and four new triangles. A large striking wheel was situated below the fan stage with operating chain held out from the strongly battered smock frame by a braced tailpole, as at Stock tower mill. Purleigh mill had a very low brick base, resembling the mill at Hatfield Peverel in this respect, and neither showed evidence of a stage. There was a boat-shaped cap with a horizontal ridge and the familiar deep petticoat of the regional smock mills.

Purleigh Barns

Composite Mill, gone

TL867998

The mill had a single-floored octagonal smock-type boarded base, perhaps 12ft across, with cant posts buttressed externally by timbers from the ground. Above was a slightly battered post mill  body containing two floors. This evidently rode round a curb built on the smock framing and provided with a rack to take the drive from the {six-bladed} fan, following the general principle of Little Laver mill and perhaps engineered by the same millwright in view of their roughly contemporary appearance. The short middlings or sail backs appear to have been located in a cross on the windshaft, and they carried a pair of cloth and a pair of spring sails {which appear single-sided in photograph}. There could have been no more than one pair of stones employed, probably for limited local use.

RADWINTER

Smock mill, gone

TL605374

The mill drove two pairs of stones, and a portable steam engine was in use. The mill had a Cambridgeshire style, with a domed cap and a single-storied octagonal brick base. The floors appear to have been ground, stone and bin, and the sails were double-shuttered anti-clockwise patents winded by an anti-clockwise 8-bladed fantail. There was no stage, and to prevent the inner drop of the striking chain fouling the inclined brick base it was made to pass outwards over a small pulley bracketed below the striking wheel. {The mill appears to have been painted white}.

RAYLEIGH 

Tower mill, standing today

TQ807910

The exterior brickwork carries the inscription J Harvey 1809. Mill has vertical base and a strongly battered cone above. For some 20ft from ground level the walls are circular, 20ft in diameter internally and 4ft 6in thick at the base; the taper is to about 11ft internal diameter at former curb level, just below which the walls are thickened somewhat from the average of 2ft on bin and stone floors to assure ample support for the cap. The height from the ground to cap ridge would have been about 60ft.

 A stage once encompassed the top of the base, from which the last working sails, two common and two spring, were set by hand. The springs were quarter-elliptic fixed halfway along the whip. The former cap was small, plain-boarded, and straight-ridged, maintaining the same section from front to rear and resembling many in Kent. The fan was six-bladed, on a lightweight framing.

RIDGEWELL, Drury Lane

Post mill, gone

TL732409

The photographs of this mill show it to have stood over a substantial roundhouse, and to have been winded by an 8-bladed fan over the rear of the tail ladder. There were four anti-clockwise single-shuttered spring sails set in an iron canister on a wooden windshaft. Donald W Muggeridge was informed in 1936 that there were two pairs of 4ft 6in French stones driven from wooden brake and tail wheels. Two further pairs of burrs were worked by engine in a building nearby.

HIGH RODING

Post mill, gone

TL606177

The windmill was worked in its latter days by four anti-clockwise spring sails on an iron shaft, turning wooden brake and tail wheels for the head and tail French burr stones comprising two pairs. A bolter and an oat crusher were in use. The centre post was in oak supporting an elm crowntree. The body was painted white, apart from the black front, and was winded by tailpole and yoke. It is generally agreed that it was demolished about 1911, leaving the – from photographic evidence – 16-sided roundhouse as a store.

MARGARET RODING

Post mill, gone

TL593105

An open-trestle post mill with four single-shuttered sails. Farries: There were two pairs of stones in the breast, one very small pair and the other large.

WHITE RODING

Tower mill, standing today

TL593105

The tower mill was erected {to replace a blown-down post mill} with little delay, and the date 1877 appears on a brick over the north door. The whitewashed tower is very well constructed, and stands 42ft high, tapering internally from 22½ ft at the base to 13½ ft at the curb. At dust floor level are porthole windows. The walls are 26in thick at the base, where there is a 2ft plinth over ground level projecting 3in outwards, providing a neat finish. A new cap was fitted in the 1970s by Lennard and Pargeter, bringing the mill to an overall height of about 50ft. The floors are, in order of descent: dust (7ft 5in), bin (7ft 8in), stone (9ft 3in), spout (9ft 6in), and ground (7ft 6in) and the former two pairs of stones were underdriven.

 When the mill was examined in 1969 no machinery remained below the windshaft, and in the absence of the cap, sails and fantail the most interesting surviving features were the curb and the winding gear. Pine was used for floor and other beams as expected in a late-built mill, and there was evidence of the use of a two-part upright shaft; the iron-segment rack and iron mortice brakewheel with 115 cogs mounted on a short iron windshaft were also of the later style of millwrighting. This iron brake wheel, one of three that have been noted in Essex, is just over 9ft in diameter. R Hawksley was informed locally (1980) that the machinery was all of iron, and was thought to have been removed shortly after the second world war.

 The tower wall is about 18in thick below the wood curb, over which rests the rack with teeth facing upward on the outer side. The curb is anchored to the tower by cotter bolts passing down about 3ft through the brickwork to eight pockets in the tower at regular intervals; these bolts are slotted near their ends and have iron wedges driven in to hold all tight against iron plates let in above each pocket. The lower half of the curb is recessed inside and is lined with a vertical iron band against which the centring wheels can run; the projection of the upper part of the curb forms a keep flange to prevent the cap from lifting.

 The cap is built over two sheers on 9ft 11in centres, across or between which extend six cross-beams: the weather, spindle and tail beams to carry the windshaft and top bearing of the upright shaft, and three tie beams, one behind the weatherbeam and two behind the tail beam. The oak weatherbeam, 11½ in deep, extends for half its depth over the sheers; the spindle and tail beams meet the sheers with double tenons and cuts for wedge adjustment. The iron windshaft rests on a swingpot neck bearing. New side horns of about 9 by 11in in section are built out from the sheers to carry rollers below and a cap-rafter circle above, the circle, like the roof spars, being newly fabricated from four layers or laminations of planed timber bolted together.

 The cap is live, turning on 10 rollers, 2 large ones of 10in diameter under the weatherbeam at the head, and 8 smaller ones of 5in diameter, and is centred by six truck wheels of 11in diameter by 2½ in face held by iron brackets, and inter-tied by 7/8 in iron rods looped round their spindles below, and forming chords of a circle, with additional anchorage to the sheers and spindle beam. The forward truck wheels are spaced 6ft 3in apart, but the rear ones at 3ft 6in. The wheels are set some distance below the sheers, to which their cast-iron brackets are bolted, and hence would exert considerable leverage strain; the brackets are accordingly double deep-webbed on their upper sections, giving them a very strong footing.

 Of the gearing from fan to rack, only that part near the point of application below the weatherbeam remained c1970. The drive was taken along the top of the left sheer and then through bevels to a worm centrally situated behind the weatherbeam. This meshed with a 2ft worm gear of 38 teeth below it, which drove a pinion of 13 teeth on its short shaft forward engaging with the upturned teeth of the rack. Whether the elaborate drive was worth its weight in additional shafting and gearing and justified its invitation to greater energy dissipation is open to debate, but to apply the winding drive at this point was a mechanically sound idea.

 Older photographs show an ogee cap in the style of Whitmore of Suffolk, a 6-bladed fantail and a braced tailpole below the fan stage acting as a chain or rope guide, and four double-shutterrd anti-clockwise patent sails. The widely spaced sheers projected at the front. There was no stage, the mill having doubtless had an original set of patent sails not requiring constant access. Above the door was a pulley for engine drive covered by a wooden frame.

BARDFIELD SALING

Post mill, gone

TL691260

As first built, with all or most of the chief members in oak, the mill body would have measured only 12ft 6in in length inclusive of the main corner posts, and 9ft 6in wide overall. The prow was shallow, barely projecting 1ft. The box-like main frame was about 12ft high, above which extended the roof framing with little curvature. Taken from the centre of the crowntree the body was hung fore and aft in the ratio 10:13, with just sufficient room forward to have taken the 4ft 8in stones of 1823. As seen and checked in 1965, only the top side rails and sheers ran through the entire 15ft 6in length of the body; the latter were doubtless original, first supporting a rear platform, while the former were probably coeval with the rear extension, designed to carry the hindermost part of the roof and give the annexed section greater stability. The original corner posts of this “four-post” windmill were slight in section – about 7in square, with no thickening-out at the tops to carry transverse members, but the added rear corner posts were only 4in square, representing, probably, a conscious effort to minimise weight if not also cost.

 The crowntree, about 21in square, carried the side girts, 15in deep on shoulders about 2in deep, no doubt over hidden dovetails. On either side were the customary intermediate upright posts on 27in centres, of quite small section, from near the feet of which diagonals ran to the side girt extremities as at Mill Green, but unlike the posts in that contemporary structure, they did not continue through to the top side rails. These girts were devoid of deep mortices or cuts and survived with little deformation until the end. Though angled into the corner posts at the rear, they appear not to have been so applied forward, where, however, the right post was a replacement in pine, and both it and its opposite oak member had added wooden plates on the inside faces to give extra support to the weather beam. As for the front of the mill body, the prick post, forward sill, meal beam and two pairs of upward converging diagonals followed closely the pattern at Mill Green.

 The designer of this mill had a penchant for jowled-out main timbers in the horizontal sense, generously dimensioned at critical points and trimmed down elsewhere. This feature was seen in the crowntree, sheers and crosstrees, and was sometimes concluded with a nicely moulded finish. The crowntree was thickened through some 3-4ft on its underside over the centre post, the sheers on both undersides and inside faces for 5-6ft, and the crosstrees – on all four faces on the lower member, and on all but the underside on the upper member – over a comparable length to the sheers. This feature also recalls Mill Green in respect of that mill’s crosstrees. At Saling the upper crosstree increased from a basic section of 11in square to 14in deep by 13in wide at the abutments to the post, where no wedges were used. Both crosstrees were variously recessed on sides and faces at their intersection within the horns of the main post in the usual manner. Granted that they were original, as doubtless was the case, these members testified to the soundness of the construction for over 200 years, though the crowntree had developed a vertical shake checked by bolts. The quarterbars carried a well-built twin-tenoned collar over which the sheers turned. Whether there was always a roundhouse is not known.

 The rear steps and fantail assembly, originally from Stisted, were certainly alien to this mill, from which the tailpole had been removed. The pine ladder strings were set wide apart and entered the mill 3ft over platform level, to be carried on added vertical timbers inside. To the left of the steps was a simple sack slide and loading platform. The fantail was 8-bladed, driving down through shafting from both ends of the fan shaft through pairs of bevel gears to heavy iron circling wheels of “travelers” of 9in face, 27in diameter and with six full-width flat spokes.

 The mill offered very cramped working conditions, as the last miller pronounced with feeling, and could not be modified to take two pairs of 4ft stones in the breast. The “nearly new” machinery of 1823 probably included the clasp-arm brakewheel with six cants, which was not a conversion from a compass-arm type. This drove a wooden stone nut and also a skew gear with pulley for dresser drive, while the sack-hoist bollard under the roof ridge was driven by slack belt from a wooden pulley built on the forward side of the brakewheel. The dresser was at floor level behind the tail stones and almost inaccessible; the miller is said to have lain full length to attend to it. The iron mortice wheel on the rear of the windshaft drove the iron nut lately brought from Great Easton.

 The front stone nut had probably been in use for a very long time. It was wooden, forming a block 18in by 9½ in deep, bound with iron rings, and had 15 wood cogs of 4 1.2 in face and 3½ in pitch, with iron pins passing down through the shanks. As recorded by Denis Sanders, it was secured on the 2½ in square iron quant by two 12in oak wedges channelled upwards through recesses cut in the nave on a pair of adjacent sides. The wedges, 2½ in wide, tapered from 1½ in thick below to 5/8 in above, and when driven home were held at the base by a U-bolt. When re-adjustment of the position of the nut was required as the stones wore thin or were replaced, it could be effected very simply. The front drive was latterly to a 4ft 6in peak stone over a French burr 2in wider; at the rear were two burrs of 4ft 6in diameter.

 The forward bray ran across the front of the mill between the corner posts, carrying the short, heavy bridgetree pivoted at the rear on a timber depending from the crowntree and braced from it by diagonals; the bray contained wedge adjustments on either side of the bridgetree end to centre the stone spindle, but this became redundant when the more sophisticated bridging box with screw control was introduced. The rear bridgetree also ran fore and aft and was carried on the bray below the bolter. Two conventional lead-ball governors were employed, each belt-driven from the stone spindles.

 The last working sails were anti-clockwise patents with single shutters 4ft by 10in as seen on the pair that remained in the 1920s. They were set in a plain canister on an all-iron windshaft, octagonal from the front journal to the rear of the brake wheel, then round. There were seven bays with three shutters in each and the innermost bay with four, all closed by the forward action of the striking rod worked by Y-wheel, rack and pinion over the rear steps. The sole sail remaining in 1960 carried an 8in leading board and a 5in board on the trailing side of the whip.

GREAT SAMPFORD

Smock mill, base survives

TL643355

The surviving mill base measures 19ft across the flats of the octagon internally at ground level, tapering to 16ft at the top of the walls, which are 2ft thick and contained two floors.

 The smock body appears white-painted and smooth, best explained as the result of laying sheets of canvas over vertical boarding, the latter being nailed over a skin of horizontal boards. Graham (Chris) Wilson, an authority on the mills of Cambridgeshire, and a practising miller at Over tower mill in that county, supports the presumption that the builder of Sampford mill came from his side of the Essex border. He cites the positioning of the window frames in relation to the framing of the smock, and the style of the braces connecting the top of the flyposts to the top of the cap. He also finds the cap shape – allowing for the fact that it has been retouched in the photo somewhat inaccurately, along with the fantail – similar to that in some former Cambridgeshire mills, for example Downham Road, Ely, now gone. Mr Wilson comments: “Vertical weatherboarding was often fixed over old horizontal boards in Cambridgeshire; first each side of the smock was measured so that the vertical boards could be cut in the workshop, the boards often being grooved down each edge and provided with a false tongue. The assembly on site was reduced to a minimum; often the original horizontal boarding was left in place, but this was not such a good idea because there was very little sound wood left at the corners to nail into later, and the vertical boards came off as a result. A good example of this was to be seen at Shade Mill, Soham. Usually narrow laths were nailed over the joints to protect the false tongues…at Sampford there may not have been any laths covering the butt joints and tongues: this would account for the mainly smooth look. Canvas was sometimes saturated in lead paint and fixed to vertical weatherboarding on smocks, as often on caps. This system of weatherboarding is very good only if the painting is to be repeated every few years at a very great expense in paint, time and labour. Today such a system would be ridiculous.” Mr Wilson cites Histon Mill as an example once canvas-covered.

 Vincent Pargeter (Essex County millwright) hazards an explanation for the presence of the heavy timber slabs applied externally to the upper few feet of the cant posts. They may have been used in conjunction with a system of tie rods to bring a distorted curb into the round.

 The mill sails appear to be tapered towards the tips, not a feature normally seen in eastern England, and certainly not in Essex. Curiously, the taper seems to derive partly, if not wholly, from the width of the leading board allowed, the indistinctness of the photograph leaving uncertain the extent of variation in shutter width. Why this eccentricity? Once again our attention is riveted by the capacity of the windmill builders and repairers to surprise and entertain us by quirks of design. No striking tackle is visible at the rear of the cap, and the two pairs of single-shuttered sails may, therefore, have been spring-operated, or have been of patent type with internal striking gear as at Great Bardfield and Southminster, Cripplegate, mills. The smock frame evidently contained three floors above the two in the brick base.

SOUTHMINSTER, East or Cripplegate Mill

Smock mill, gone

TM962001

The photographic record shows the mill both with and without sails, the last working set being a pair each of single and double-shuttered patents. The six-bladed fantail sat incongruously over the rear of the cap, with the least of visible supports, clearly not part and parcel of the original structure. The cap was built to protect the former hand winding gear at the rear in a practical but far from comely fashion, unrelieved by petticoat or gallery. The brick base was stepped on the exterior in a manner reminiscent of the larger example at Bulmer.

SPRINGFIELD

Broomfield Mill

Post mill, gone

TL717102

A photograph exists showing the then remaining two common sails, which turned anti-clockwise, and a plain weatherboarded body over a single-storied brick roundhouse. Winding was by tailpole. Instead of windows the body had ports. The sails descended very low.

Pease Hall Mill

Smock mill, gone

TL733066

A number of photographs show features broadly comparable with those of other smock mills in south and central Essex, and we may presume that we are viewing the work of one of the Moulsham-based millwrights. There was a boat-shaped cap with deep petticoat and four boarded floors over a single-storied brick base, and also a distinctive seven-bladed fantail as at Hatfield Peverel. The full complement of sails does not appear in known views; the pair which remained in the derelict period were single-shuttered turning anti-clockwise {Farries photo appears to show two single-sided common and 2 single-shuttered spring sails}. There was a mill stage, but apparently no gallery around the cap. Several interior views and external shots through gaping boarding show a wooden clasp-arm brakewheel on an iron windshaft, a wooden upright shaft and a wooden great spur gear, also of clasp-arm construction. The stones were arranged underdrift on the second floor, and their weight and that of the driving machinery was transferred down to ground level by four vertical posts of stout section supporting the main stone floor beams. There were probably three pairs of stones.

STAMBOURNE

Mill Road

Open-trestle post mill, gone

TL714391

The white-painted mill body was plainly built, without porch or projections at the rear, and was winded by tailpole with a simple yoke attached. A sack slide descended the rear ladder. There were four spring sails, single-shuttered and turning anti-clockwise, and a wheeled staging was pushed round the mill for shutter adjustment. The brick piers rose to above head height and the base timbers bore evidence of the depredations of the weather, having reinforcements at the lower joints.

STANFORD RIVERS

Post mill, gone

TL515026

The mill body, with oval ports, stood over a large roundhouse having two floors, and winding was by tailpole. There were four single-shuttered, anti-clockwise sails, which from photographic views appear to have been spring-patents with laminated springs to form the cross. The striking gear was inside the mill, and the weatherboarded body showed no external feature worthy of comment.

STANSTED MOUNTFITCHET

Tower mill, standing today

TL510248

A sale notice of 1807 describes the windmill at Stansted as having 6 floors, and it was little doubt built in 1787 to the considerable height of over 57ft as seen today. The stones were at first on the second floor down, and a stage was set around the mill at the level of the floor below, now the stone floor. According to a sale notice of 1846 the stage was 24ft above the base, and there was also a “round house”, both probably removed in 1865. The allocation of height to floors is: cap (roof hatch to curb base) 10ft; dust 7ft; bin 8ft 6in; stone 9ft 9in; spout (with part of a former floor on its west side) 13ft 9in; ground 7ft. Cap and flooring thicknesses and the raised and boarded ground floor bring the total to the stated figure. The tower tapers internally from 21½ feet across at base to 10ft at the curb, and the brickwork, 27in thick at the ground, loses a course internally at about 3ft above the ground floor, after which it is no more than about 18-20in thick at higher levels. This is in notable contrast with the much sturdier construction at Thaxted, a later-built mill. Movement of the brickwork has caused concern at times, and in 1930 Rex Wailes was instrumental in having 3 iron bands placed around the tower to safeguard it from splitting. In 1975 further work on the tower was done by J W Gray & Son Ltd of Witham.

 The tower interior is expertly rendered and, with a cream wash, acts as a good light reflector. The floor beams alternate in direction for the most part, following the main cardinal points, but those supporting the stone and bin floors both run east-west. The ladders are “stacked” in the south-east sector, and the sack traps were situated in the south centre.

 The cap base-framing compares very closely with that at Thaxted, there being a pair of straight-through sheers in oak, 10½ in wide by 8½ in deep on 9ft 6in centres, and a pair of secondary sheers 6½ in wide by 8½ in deep on 3ft 7in centres set between the spindle and rear tie beams. The tail beam for the existing windshaft is halved over the secondary sheers. The weatherbeam, about 12 in sq, is bowed well forward at centre to the extent of 10½ in so that it follows the curb. It is set in the same plane at base as the sheers and is tenoned and heavily dogged to them, with a small overlap corresponding to its greater depth. It is probably a replacement timber dating from 1860, when an all-iron windshaft was fitted. Not unnaturally, it has shown a strong tendency to “roll out”, and the pillow blocks above it have been tied by irons to a pine beam, evidently itself a late-added member, which is halved under the sheers in front of the brake wheel. The comparatively mint condition of this tie beam is in contrast with the rear oak framing, which was doubtless of the C18 design, there being no evidence of tail-beam seatings in the sides of the main sheers.

 The vertically boarded cap has both a cap circle, 13in wide by 4in deep, below which the live rollers are mounted, and a cap rafter circle, 5in wide by 3in deep, blocked up at the sides on the cap circle. From the smaller rim 12 spars ascend to the elliptical apex of the cap, which is framed by two wood segment rings breaking joint and having internal diameters of 28in and 24in along the major and minor axes. Over the aperture so formed is a hatch which may be removed to allow a man to gain access to the cap or fan. Preserved on the spout floor is a ladder curved to the shape of the cap. It is 11ft long, has 5in by 2in stringers on 22 in centres, and 14 treads on the convex side, and is a very heavy item to manhandle. 1¾ in holes are drilled, one near the end of each stringer, for rope attachment, and the unit was evidently passed out of the spout floor door when required and drawn up by ropes to the cap, which is domed and without gallery.

 The curb, 10in across by 7in deep, is iron-shod on the full depth of its inside face for the large and heavy centring wheels, and is of live type, having had probably 10 rollers running over an iron track: some under the head were missing in 1975. Winding was by a large wooden worm, which operated against a wood rack having cogs of 4½ in pitch and 3½ in face. The right-handed eight-bladed fan was set up between vertical posts supported by oak members laid over and extending from the sheers, as at Upminster, with triangulating members at the rear and ties to the cap-hatch ring for steadying. The cap was built out low to the fan posts, below which was a small suspended platform.

 The circular iron windshaft is probably that supplied by Thomas Seabrook in 1860 for £25, along with a set of fan tackle for the same price. The windshaft has a flanged coupling about 3ft from the tail bearing. The 8ft clasp-arm brakewheel, which we may assume was not original, and does not show excessive wear, is offset to the rear of the square cast on the shaft and intended for a head wheel; it is held by wood packing forming a square, and extending back 2ft 6in to a specially added iron square fitting cast in two halves and bolted round the shaft. This arrangement may date from the introduction of the iron mortice wallower, a single casting with a square hub and eight arms, of comparatively small diameter, which sits awkwardly on the wooden upright shaft. The brake wheel has iron segment teeth, slightly bevelled and of about 2½in pitch only, in contrast with the 5in pitch of the former wooden cogs. The clasp arms are doubled and of oak; the six cants, rim, and the brake also are of elm.

 The upright shaft bears no traces of compass-arm mortises at wallower level, or indeed at any other wheel setting, implying either the former use of a wallower similar in construction to the surviving upturned face gear below the dust floor, built up with wood and having four cants wedged to the shaft, or the substitution of the existing shaft for a C18 original. The face gear in the bin floor was for machine drive, oerating from its south side the sack hoist by slack belt, and from the north a line shaft on the spout floor by pulley and slack belt also. The sack hoist system comprised a cluster of three drums on the dust floor in the Heath Robinson tradition. The control rope, when pulled from any point in its descent through the mill, wound up a chain through a suitable mechanical advantage on the first bollard which in turn raised a lever supporting one end of the second bollard, and so drew the slack belt tight. This caused the second drum to turn and to wind up a chain which passed over a third drum directly above the traps, giving a vertical loft. The first two drums are of wood, the third of iron.

 Below the bin floor is the iron mortice great spur gear, cast in two halves and bolted together forming a 21in square inside for the wedging to the upright shaft, here trimmed to a 16in square. The sprattle beam runs north-south, and measures about 30in long by 13in wide by 10in deep; it has two-way angled cuts on either side for wedging adjustment under and over a horizontally disposed tenon, the wedges being forced in against a pair of horizontal beams running east-west below the similarly aligned bin-floor beams. Both sets of beams are about 10in sq; the lower are on 37in centres, the upper 42in centres, and there is 18 ½ in clearance between them, measured vertically. They are the original stone floor beams above, and the original sprattle and bridgetree bearers below, and they call to mind the preserved correspondence of 1863 on the question of the conversion from underdrift to overdrift. Stock tower mill was the scene of a similar modification. Both pairs of beams disclose the original stone positions. The third pair had been added prior to the conversion, evidently by the Hicks brothers, tenants, who were owners of the extra pair of stones and fixtures. One of the stone bearers for this added, first generation pair is still in situ. The lower box beams have mortices centrally cut within their depth 14½ in long by 4¾ in wide by 3¾ in deep on 4ft centres from the sprattle centre, but there is only one such mortice on the inside face of each beam. In each case the beam opposite has empty bolt holes, suggesting the former presence of hangers. These positions were evidently occupied by bridgetrees. Directly above on the side faces of the bin floor beams are the centre points between further mortices where the stone bearers were once lodged. Circular beds for the former stones are cut down into the floorbeams, showing their diameters to have been about 4ft 8in. The east and west stones would then have been about 9ft on centres apart; the interval is now 9ft 6in. The change from common to patent sails often resulted in a reduction in the spacing of the stone centres, as smaller nuts were employed, thereby speeding up the stones, but in this case the new great spur was larger than the old, and the present nuts, of 20in diameter, are perhaps comparable in size with the earlier ones. In this context, the tenders by Rawlings of Cambridge and Fyson of Soham for the conversion of 1863 are informative. Rawlings proposed fixing iron segment teeth on the existing spur wheel, giving a diameter of 7ft 3½ in, while Fyson, who actually performed the work, proposed “a New Spur Wheel 8 Feet High with wood cogs”, corresponding to that now seen. As the stones were to be moved in any case, there was little point in adhering to the old spacing of the various spindles. It was Rawlings’ intention to set the stones to sails ratio at 8 to 1. The gearing as now seen is arranged 99-44 and 140-28, the great spur wheel having no fewer than 140 cogs; the stones would therefore turn 11¼ times to one revolution of the sails.

 A point of interest is that the original stone bearers, 12in wide by 4in deep, on 2ft 9in centres, were not dropped into open recesses in the floor beams, but were housed completely within them, as noted, leaving the 1½ in thickness intact above them which was partly cut away on a curve to allow the bedstone to be let into the upper face of the bearers. The bearers would thus of necessity have been set into the pair of beams when they were first built into the tower.

 The descent of the stones to a lower floor led to a number of modifications and improvements. Two large bins were partitioned off on the bin floor extending from floor to ceiling, with hatches in the dust floor to give entry. The residual flooring on the west side between the present stone and spout floors gives 7½ feet head clearance under the stone floor joists, and once extended across the mill completely, repairs to the tower wall having shown the recesses for a former north-south floor beam parallel to the one surviving. With the setting up of the bridgetrees and brays in their present positions, movement about this floor would have been seriously frustrated at the level where the miller spends much of his time. The major segment of the offending floor area was therefore removed, leaving only the section beyond the west floor beam, with one of the bridgetrees above it – at waist height, to prove the point – and a small platform for the bolter on the south. The present bin (original stone) floor had four windows to give adequate light for stone dressing, but the east and west windows are now bricked in.

 The east and west bridgetrees now seen run north-south and form a pair; the north bridgetree runs east-west. Each unit is separately governed, the normal centrifugal ball-type governors being slung under the stone-floor timbers at convenient distances to operate the steelyards. As the spout and stone floors are 13ft 9in apart, and need a 20-tread ladder to link them, the north and east bridgetrees were far above the miller’s head and have long vertical rods with T-pieces at the lower ends over head height for tenter control. Only the north stones had a bray. The bridging boxes for the east and west stones are packed up with wooden blocks laid on the bridgetrees, one of several methods of vertical adjustment, and probably betokening compensation for wear on the stone.

 As the present stone floor is 9ft 9in high, being originally used as the spout floor, and as the new great spur gear occupied the position of its predecessor, the all-iron stone nuts are set high above the runner stones, the quants being in two sections coupled together by flanges with 3 bolts. The upper sections are 3ft 2in overall, and the lower 4ft 8in. The quants are cast circular, but change to square to vibrate the shoes. All the stone nuts could be moved sideways out of gear. The bearings immediately below them, in which the spindles run, were attached to horizontal wooden pieces which at one end were halved into an elongated mortise. The removal of a block from this permitted the lateral displacement of the bridge. The east and west stones have the control for the positioning of the nuts over the tops of the box beams, but the north nut shows an extraordinary support arrangement consisting of two parallel cantilevered beams about 5½ in sq on 24 in centres, extending 37 in beyond the north face of the box beam to the tops of which they are double-bolted. Some “chatter” was doubtless experienced when the great spur was running, and further timbers have been added to triangulate where necessary and to draw firm support from the mill wall. When the stones were due for dressing the nuts could be slid out of gear and the lower quant sections, or crotch spindles, unbolted and removed. All three pairs of stone remain, and all are French burrs of 4ft diameter.

 The lineshaft for machine drive is situated in the north-west sector of the spout floor more or less in line with the north bridgetree. It could be lowered at its west end by rope control to take up the slack on the belt from the pulley on the bin floor, whose shaft carried a mortice iron nut with 16 cogs in mesh with the 48 cogs of the upturned face gear on the upright shaft. The lineshaft is 3ft 3in long overall and carries three pulleys, two wooden and one of iron. From west to east their purpose was: bolter drive, receipt of the belt drive from above, and drive to an agitating device, evidently the jumper mentioned in the correspondence, but no longer present. The bolter is preserved.

 A photograph of the mill taken c1870 clearly shows two pairs of anti-clockwise double-shuttered patent sails with 10 bays of 3 shutters in each, totalling 240, but views of the mill c1925 show the empty frames of single-shuttered patents with 10 bays, as though the leading sides had been sawn off. Shutters stored on the spout floor are of two sizes, each 10in wide, and 3ft and 4ft long, wood-framed and canvas-covered. Their dimensions and the c1870 view appear to accord.

STAPLEFORD ABBOTTS

Boyland’s Oak Mill

Post mill, gone

TQ512944

Photographs of the mill’s ruined condition show four single-shuttered anti-clockwise sails, and the absence of weatherboarding exposes a side framing very much akin to that at Mill Green, Ingatestone. Possibly it was an old mill brought from elsewhere. The side girts ran to the main rear corner posts, behind which lay an “extended” section housing the dresser. The body was tarred, winded by tailpole and stood over a single-storey roundhouse.

STOCK

Tower mill, standing today

TQ698987

Stock mill was built c1800. It can prove a disappointment to those expecting to find the original contents in situ, for such include little more than the brake wheel rim, major and minor floor beams and bearers, a stone-raising bollard, and probably some items connected with the sack hoist. Most of the remainder is of comparatively recent date, and must be related to a conversion to underdrive to facilitate the application of engine power – and this in a mill which in more primitive times had already undergone a change from under to overdrive, as detailed below.

 The mill is entered today on its north-east side, and is approached through the very small enclosure from the north west. The tower, built of red brick, stands about 40ft high to the underside of the curb, and internally tapers from 20ft 6in at base to 12½ ft at top. The wall thickness for the most part is 18in, but this is augmented up to first floor level by an additional lining of brick inside, and measures 22in at ground level. The enormous boat-shaped cap takes the mill to the overall height of about 52ft, and it overhangs the mill exterior at the rear by 4ft, formerly accommodating the hand-winding device, and now the remaining fantail gearing and the backwards-placed tail bearing of the windshaft.

 The floors in descending order, with heights, are: dust, 8ft; bin, 8½ ft; stone, 7ft; spout, 8½ ft and ground 7ft. The floor beams alternate at right angles to right angles on succeeding floors: those supporting the spout and bin floors running approximately north-south. Most are chamfered on their undersides and enter the tower walls over wooden pallets about 2½ feet long let into the brickwork. One on the spout floor is part of an old middling. The stone-floor beams are 12in sq, the bin floor beams somewhat lighter, and those supporting the spout and dust floors are about 9½ in sq. There was formerly a stage at first floor level with two loading doors, and a second entry door at base has been bricked up. The windows are staggered round the tower.

 The massive pair of beams supporting the second or stone floor were probably thought sufficient to bear the two pairs of stones, set north and south, which this floor initially carried, but at a later date, with the installation of a third pair on the west side, three vertical posts of 10in by 11in section were introduced to share the burden. These posts stand on the ground floor and are 14ft 8in long. They are unrelated to the first floor beams and two of them run up squarely to the centres of the stone floor beams and the third to a transverse member beneath the added pair of stones. The posts are not chamfered, and are out of character with the earlier timbers. Roland W Smith noted during an inspection of the mill in early 1976 that it must have started life with two pairs of stones on what has since become the bin floor, the stones eventually being moved to the floor below in a manner comparable to that described under Stansted. The evidence of the mill timbers cannot be contested. The bin floor has, uncharacteristically, 3 windows, one admitting light into a bin. In the ceiling of this floor are two bearings 3ft 5in on centres from the upright shaft, evidently for locating a pair of quants, and on the same spacing between the bin floor beams below are housings for bridgetree hangers set into heavy floor joists formerly acting as stone bearers. The bin floor was raised 6in to reduce the original 7ft 11in clearance under the dust floor beams above to the present 7ft 5in and to allow more headroom on what became the stone floor. The cavities in the tower beneath the bin floor beam and joist ends created by the raising operation were blocked in by wood and brick. Also of note is the inappropriate setting of the present stone-floor beams in relation to the positioning of the stones above them.

 The wooden curb is in two segments, upper and lower, each about 11in wide by 4½ in deep and breaking joint, and was provided with a central iron track and also a keep flange on the inside of the upper ring against which run the centring wheels. The rack, composed of iron segment teeth of 3in pitch and 2½ in face, is on the outside, and above the curb is a wooden circle 6in by 2½ in deep, containing some 24 rollers of 4in diameter by 2in wide spaced at about 20in intervals comprising the shot curb. The curb proper is anchored to the tower by means of 4 iron straps which are angled over the brickwork to follow the walls down to the undersides of the dust floor beams where they are further secured. The shot rollers follow the iron trackway as the cap circle rides over them; the latter is 11in wide by 5½ in deep, iron-plated beneath, and chamfered on its upper and inner arris; it is built up under the sheers and other base members of the cap framing as opportunity offers. The cap roof itself is built on a sizeable segmented ring of approximate section 8in by 4in from which spring 12 intermediate rafters on about 16in centres to a ridge piece.

 The oak sheers, on 11ft centres, are 10in sq and curve inwards towards their ends. They support the weatherbeam 15in wide at centre by 12in deep, and the tailbeam 12in by 9in which, most unusually, lies to the rear of the cap circle. There are tie beams between the sheers fore and aft of the brake wheel, and also at the rear, and to the underside of the framing are attached the 7 centring wheels. By clock-face reckoning, taking the front bearing of the windshaft as 12 o’clock, these would be at 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 11 o’clock. The centring wheels are of 7in diameter by 2in wide, but the rear one is 11in in diameter and is carried on a massive bracket fixed to the transverse beam to which it is also well braced.

 The cap was eventually winded by fantail, which drove to the rack via two bevels and fanshaft level and so down to gearing still in position under the cap; this comprises a bevel gear (its driving bevel now missing) on a transverse horizontal shaft carrying also a worm, which drove a horizontal worm wheel on a short vertical shaft giving the final drive by spur pinion to the rack below.

 The iron windshaft appears too long for this mill and was presumably brought from another. It has a canister with flanges similar in style to those at Mill Green, Ingatestone. The brass neck bearing is unexceptional, and the neck is closely flanked by shaped wooden check pieces built out from the weather studs, and commonly employed in Essex. The brake wheel measures 9ft 4in across, and an iron spider with 6 T-section arms bolted to the 6 cants and cast in two halves has replaced the former clasp arms. The wheel has retained its 81 wooden cogs, which are geared to 25 teeth in the all-iron wallower. The brake is wooden. The wallower is planked solid on its underside for friction drive to the sack-hoist drum, which is held in position by an elaborate system of posts and braces, being high over dust floor level.

 The upright shaft is circular, of 5in diameter, and in 3 sections, with dog clutches just above bin and dust floor levels and intermediate bearings just below. From the top to bottom bearings it runs through 28½ ft, and on the spout floor carries the great spur wheel, a 6-armed iron mortice gear of 5ft diameter, and cast in one piece by Christy and Norris of Chelmsford, as recorded in the casting itself. There are 76 wood cogs, which drove three stone nuts, two all-iron, one iron mortice, and each with 25 teeth, so that the overall gear ratio to the stones was derived from the combinations 81-25 and 76-25, giving approximately 10 revolutions of the stones to one of the sails. The underdriven stones were controlled by a single governor of the two-ball type with a lift of about 3½ in, whose shaft extended up to the ceiling of the floor above – the stone floor, where a belt drive from the upright shaft was applied.

 The mounting of the stone spindles is of late C19 type. Brays were dispensed with altogether and fixed wooden bridgetrees with bridging boxes on top were provided, having the footstep bearing – in a sliding pot – raised and lowered by an iron pin set on a pivoted arm below, itself operated by the governor through steelyards. All the old wooden bridgetrees, brays and their supports have been removed. The pivoted arms or tenter bars are aligned under the sprattle beam for the upright shaft and a heavy beam extending from the sprattle to the north-west storey post; these serve, therefore, as bridgetrees. This compact arrangement would have saved space for the bagging and storage of meal, but the bridgetrees were inconveniently low. The stone nuts were raised out of gear on a taper by a crank handle turning a small pinion against a vertical rack.

 Keyed onto the upright shaft just below the great spur gear is a 6-armed iron mortice wheel, being a downturned bevel gear for the engine drive. The shaft entering from outside the mill doubtless also drove auxiliary machinery, now absent. When engine power was applied, the wind drive was disconnected by the removal of four slip-cogs in the brakewheel. Beside their mortices on the front of the wheel were carved the numerals I, II, III, IIII, and these cogs had special iron pins with flat backs for securing the cog tails when in position.

 The three vertical 14ft 8in posts mentioned above terminate below the three pairs of stones, all of which are still present although most of their trappings are gone. The “original” pairs, French burrs lying north and south, are 7ft apart on centres. The west pair is 5ft on centres for each of the others, and the diameters measure: north 5ft; south 4ft 7in; west 4ft. The large north runner is turned over for inspection: it is composed of no fewer than 25 burr segments and is 10in thick. The south runner has four balance boxes on its top, with “BEAR OF IPSWICH AND SUDBURY” cast on the cover plates. A stone-raising bollard, with staggered mortices for insertion of a crowbar, is in place over the north stones between bin-floor timbers. It is 4ft long, of 6½ in diameter, and turns in stout wooden bearings. The south stones had a similar arrangement, but the west runner was lifted from an iron hook and the skirt around its bedstone was fixed after the removal of part of the skirting for the north stones, thereby showing the sequence of stone emplacement. The older stones had octagonal vats, the added pair a circular vat.

 The last sails were a pair each of anti-clockwise single and double-shuttered patents struck from the ground by a chain passing through a guide at mid-height between fanstage and ground. This guide was on a dropped timber braced to the rear cap frame. The right-handed, six-bladed fan was set well back on the pair of inclined members supported by two vertical posts at the rear of the fan platform; it compounded the already marked asymmetry of the cap, seen in side elevation, and under this load and that of the backwards-set windshaft, the cap developed an ominous tilt before eventual restoration.

TAKELEY

Post mill, gone

TL557233

Details of the “Old Mill” – so called by the family – were recorded in 1936 by Donald W Muggeridge from that source. Latterly it had four single-shuttered spring sails, one pair with wooden and one with canvas shutters, but had formerly worked on four cloth sails, then two cloth and two spring and, from c1886, on four spring. In the middle 1880s Fred Chopping, employed by Gentry of Braintree, millwright, fitted a cast-iron windshaft to replace the old wooden one, and the substructure, hitherto open, was enclosed in a 16-sided weatherboarded roundhouse. The tailpole, which had a yoke for turning, was sawn off at the rear steps and a six-bladed fantail provided for winding.

 The internal arrangements were unusual. The brake wheel, of wood, with applewood cogs, drove two pairs of stones: one very large pair of French burrs, of 5ft diameter, direct through an ordinary gear, and a small pair, of 3ft diameter, consisting of a peak bedstone and a burr runner, by a belt drive. The late Rev F G Clarke recorded that the small pair of stones was on the top floor, an arrangement otherwise unknown to him. Presumably there was a short vertical shaft above the windshaft with a gear to receive the drive from the top of the brake wheel, and also a pulley to transmit the belt drive horizontally to the rear to turn the stones. It would represent a relatively inexpensive device to increase a primitive mill’s output. One may note that St Leonard’s Mill, Winchelsea, had a pair of 3ft stones in the top floor, but driven from the tail wheel. Takeley mill also had a flour dresser and an oat crusher.

 The mill body was supported by an oak post and substructure and an elm crowntree. This was clearly a mill of small capacity, probably built originally to take only one pair of stones. The sails turned anti-clockwise. The forward corner posts were apparently of the “gunstock head” variety, thickened out forwards from the waist upwards, in a manner more pronounced than that at Mill Green, Ingatestone, and pointing perhaps to the use of inverted tree trunks, cut and trimmed to suit their function in the mill.

TENDRING

Tower mill, gone

TM150239

The massive brick-built windmill worked three pairs of stones, each of 52in diameter, and had very extensive storage space, having on two flanks a two-storey granary built on, over which turned four double-shuttered anti-clockwise patent sails winded by a six-bladed fantail.

TERLING

Smock mill, standing today

TL765150

Before its conversion into a residence Terling mill was exhaustively surveyed from a technical standpoint in 1968-9. The basic details and features of special interest are treated below.

 The height to the underside of the finial plate was about 56 feet, distributed as follows: finial plate to curb top: 10ft 10in; curb top to dust flooring: 7ft 2in; bin floor: 7ft; stone floor: 9ft 8in; spout floor 9ft 8in; ground floor 10ft 3in. The last lay about 18in over the level outside. The brick base decreased in thickness from 28in to 17in through a height of 9½ ft and measured 21½ ft across the flats internally; the inside diameter of the curb above was 12ft 8in.

 The framing of the smock was carefully examined in 1968 in view of the alleged removal from Cressing in the early C19, but the results were not conclusive, though they suggested the transport and re-erection of the mill in parts. The cant posts, of pine, and the main framing members were wood-plated and iron-strapped to an unusual degree, and the only clear examples noted of transoms tenoned into the cant posts were at one or two junctions under the dust floor. Three cant posts on the north and west sides of the mill have been retained in the conversion of the early 1970s; these are of pitch pine, about 9½ in by 6in in section, quite devoid of mortises, and evidently replacements. The framing was bolted to them, as in a typical example on the stone floor where a shaped iron piece, 33in long by 3½ in wide by 1½ in thick was joggled across the cant post between two transoms. It is reported that one at least of the discarded posts had sawn-off tenons, a likely legacy from a dismembering operation for a removal in parts, and to this post the mating timbers had been butt-jointed and bracketed.

 For orientation, the mill lane runs south east to north west, and the main original entrance door into the base is on the south-east side facing the Mill House a few yards off. The floor beams run northwest to southwest under the stone floor, but the dust floor beams are uncomfortably north-south. The stones were overdriven; they consisted of two pairs of French burrs in the original south-west and north-east positions, and a third added pair of peaks on the north-west. Both the bin- and stone floor beams are paralleled beneath by a second pair of beams. Those over the stone floor carry the sprattle beam for the upright shaft, which is bolted up beneath them, and has central support from stanchions carrying through from the ground floor. The members beneath the stone floor beams carry the bridgetrees. All these beams are in pine. The sprattle bearers rest on dropped transoms but the bin-floor beams just above rest on timbers spiked onto the inside framing. The stone floor beams also sit on dropped transoms, while the bridgetree bearers, 11½ in deep by 6in wide, are carried over the loading door lintels on opposite sides of the spout floor.

 There is little doubt that the disposition of floors and machinery has been radically altered over the years, resulting, for instance, in the anomalous bin-floor suspension at about three feet over the nearest transoms. A theoretical explanation for this is that an original wooden shaft about 25ft long extending down to a great spur wheel beneath the stone floor for underdrive was replaced by the two-part iron upright shaft with overdrive, the old bin floor beams then being used to support the sprattle and to keep the spur over head height. A new floor built above would accommodate the grain bins. This hypothesis was not checked in the mill when circumstances permitted. The three sets of transoms in the smock frame from sill to curb are, on centres, 8ft 8in, 7ft 6in, 9ft 8in and 7ft 3in.

 The canvas-covered domed cap, shaped by 20 rafters, was formerly lathed, plastered and whitewashed inside. The rafters are in two sections above and below a wooden ring. The base frame of the cap is of a type once commonly seen in Cambridgeshire, and quite uncharacteristic of Essex millwrighting. Here there are no all-through sheers as, for example, at Stock mill, but three pairs of discontinuous longitudinal timbers to link the various cross members fore and aft of the centrally placed spindle beam, which forms the main structural axis running 14ft 6in between the cap boarding. The rear or tail sheers are made up of doubled timbers each 10in wide by 11½ in deep, consisting of oak above and pine beneath, and extending back on 5ft 8in centres to the rear of the fan stage, about 11ft overall. Intermediately are set the former tail beam, in oak, and the present tail beam, 26in on centres further to the rear, and passing over the curb. The sheers also carry the transverse fan-post supporting beam. Two horns project obliquely into the flanking spaces between sheer and spindle beam to give further bearing points on the curb. The spindle beam is doubled in the manner of the sheers, and at the upper (oak) level large wooden shipwright’s “knees” have been bolted into the angles between these timbers behind the spindle beam. The knees measure 40in across the points by 18in at the central waist. The bearing for the upright shaft is attached to the rear of the spindle beam and to its lower (pine) section.

 Forward of the spindle beam, the short intermediate sheers, 8in square by 3ft in the clear, outflank the very large brake wheel (10ft 8in diameter) on 11 ½ ft centres, converging to 9½ ft on centres, approximately stated, at their entry into the forward tie beam, two oak horns on 4ft 8in centres, which may be regarded as the head sheers, run forward to support the short weatherbeam (6ft only) via a transverse member and pillow blocks above, and themselves are supported off the curb by two large iron rollers of 14in diameter below. The T-junctions of all these main cap members are held by bolts set in on the concealed handrail bolt principle. The main stroke of the T in each case carries centrally a threaded rod and has a pocket for introducing and fixing a nut: the rod passes through the cross timber and there is held by an external washer and nut. The junctions between horns and forward tie beams are strengthened beneath by large chocks for centring-wheel carriage.

 It is possible that the doubling of the main cap-base framing was not merely a reinforcing measure, but was allied to the replacement of a dead by a live curb, such as led to the raising of the whole cap at Tiptree. The upper, oak members are all approximately in the same plane and are about 12in on centres above the curb top. The doubling was certainly not found sufficient in itself to ensure overall rigidity of the cap structure, a fact which need occasion no surprise when the weight of windshaft and sails at front and of the winding gear at rear are considered. Two heavy horizontal T-section iron members 6in wide and ¾in thick pass from the rear horns forward between the two timbers composing the spindle beam, and curve inwards at the front to follow the curb, their overall length being at least 11ft. They are bolted to the frame and give a much needed stiffening, while the tail sheers have been further braced against sag by tie rods passing up and over two 5ft by 6in sq pine verticals or pylons footed on them at the old tail-beam junctions. The weather studs are also strongly tied by irons to the forward transverse tie beam, and the cant posts are heavily bracketed with iron pieces to the curb, so that the gibe that the mill was built of iron with timber ties would not be lacking an element of truth.

 For winding there was an 8-bladed, right-handed fantail operating through two bevels, two spur pinions, with provision for disengagement at this level, two bevels, two further bevels, of which the driven one was on the worm shaft, and finally the iron worm and external rack, of 3in pitch. On the curb top is an iron channel within which the cap rollers run, those intermediate between the 14in diameter head rollers and 6in tail rollers being about 3in in diameter by 2½ in wide. These are all held by iron carriage pieces under the elm cap circle, except for the large pair at the front, which are attached to the horns direct, the cap circle being there interrupted. Iron brackets beneath the centring wheels project under the vertical iron plate against which the wheels run; this was to prevent the cap from lifting.

 The iron windshaft is circular in section, and is inclined at a relatively steep angle; it rests at the head above a swing pot containing a wood bearing said to be of ash, and fitted by Hunt of Soham. The last sails were two pairs of anti-clockwise double-shuttered patents with an estimated 74ft span and unexceptional striking gear. The drive to the stones, largely retained in the conversion, consisted of the clasp-arm brakewheel of 10ft 8in diameter with 96 cogs, and iron 8-armed mortice wallower of 5ft 4in diameter with 47 cogs, a wooden clasp-arm great spur wheel with 108 cogs, and 3 stone nuts: one of iron, with 26 teeth, and one of wood, with 26 cogs, both driving French stones, and a wooden nut with 25 cogs driving a pair of peak stones. The burrs ran at 8.8 revolutions compared with the sails, and the peaks at 8.5. There were separate governors for each pair of stones driven from their spindles, which in all cases stood on iron bridgetrees tangential to the great spur gear, and were supported on wooden brays.

 Engine drive from outside the northwest quarter of the mill was brought in by belt and pulley and transmitted to the spout floor, where it was applied to pulleys mounted on the spindles of the north-east and south-west stones. The spur gear had been fitted with a downturned gear ring in iron segments with wood cogs, and also with a wood pulley, but the further drive from or to these had been removed by 1948. The machine drive by wind power came from a downturned iron gear cast in two halves amd having 70 wood cogs on the upright shaft under the dust floor, which drove by pulley and belt a lineshaft with five pulleys in the southeast of the stone floor, and thence to various machines, including the sack hoist on the dust floor by slack belt {and an oat crusher (Vol.5)}.