Mill news and topical information - Archive page 8

Homebrew electricity turbines

If you are looking for advice on how to build a homebrew wind turbine then otherpower.com has a goal to share all their results, whether successful or failures, free of charge. Whilst wind is not their only power source, they do have a good selection of designs available, and have a look at their turbine test rig - a model A Ford!

They also run a discussion board, and the Homebrewed electricity section has lots more info on home built (or home renovated) turbines.
Item: #199, Posted: 6/1/04.

Wind & Water: the Medieval Mill - Conference

The Center for Medieval Studies at Penn State University, is organizing a Spring Conference on the subject of Wind & Water: the Medieval Mill on 16th and 17th April 2004. Speakers include representatives from the USA, Britain, Ireland, and Australia, with a Medieval Banquet also planned for the Friday night.
See also:Item #197
Item: #198, Posted: 5/1/04.

Molinello's Post Medieval Windmill, Penn State

Four mechanical engineering students at Penn State University have grouped together under the name Molinello, and are developing a post mill for educational purposes to compliment the current Medieval Garden on the university campus.

The design is loosely based on Robertson's windmill at Williamsburg, though additional engineering analysis including wind tunnel testing has been applied to come up with a full design. The detailed drawings have been used so far to construct a table top model. Progress reports document the work that the group has done.

Construction of the final mill is due for Spring 2004 - whether this will be full size, or half size is currently undetermined. The aim is to have the mill ready for the Spring 2004 PSU Medieval Conference on "Wind & Water".
See also:Item #95
Item: #197, Posted: 5/1/04.

OBE for wind energy pioneer Dale Vince

In the 2004 New Years Honours List, Dale Vince, Managing director of Ecotricity Limited has been awarded an OBE for services to the Environment and to the Electricity Industry.

Now living in Herefordshire, he grew up in Norfolk, where Ecotricity has turbines at Swaffham, and there's a Norfolk slant to the report of his OBE carried in the Eastern Daily Press.

Ecotricity has approval to build a wind farm at Dagenham, to power Ford's Dagenham plant.
Item: #196, Posted: 4/1/04.

Chillenden - more details and pictures

The Chillenden windmill and the Chillenden Village pages give more details on the collapse of the mill. The collapse occurred around 10am on Nov 26th, in strong southerly gales. Kent County Council, the owners, responded very quickly, and visited just hours after it fell to inspect and erect safety fencing. A further inspection on 28th Nov 2003 including loss adjusters, structural engineers, millwrights, crane operator, and Friends of Chillenden windmill resulted in an unequivocal statement that the windmill will be rebuilt!.

Dismantling of the remains was due for 8th Dec, but the operation was delayed about a week due to problems installing a temporary access road across adjacent fields. Remains were carried off by the millwrights IJP for storage. It is hoped that rebuilding work can begin this Spring 2004, with opening unlikely to be until summer 2005 at the earliest.

The site includes a gallery of photos of the collapsed mill, and notes that ironically more people went to see the mill once it collapsed than had visited in the previous 2 years.

Update: A later note indicates that the removal work was completed in the week before Christmas, but bits of the temporary road lasted almost until the New Year.
Mills: [Chillenden]
See also:Item #175, Item #169
Item: #195, Posted: 3/1/04.

Recent photo of Chailey windmill

There's a photo of Chailey windmill taken on 23rd Dec 2003 available, along with a summary history of the mill.
Mills: [Chailey]
Item: #194, Posted: 3/1/04.

Moulton windmill update from Restoration

The update programme for the BBC's Restoration series, broadcast on 2nd January 2004, detailed how the final part of funding for the restoration of Moulton windmill has now been assembled, after 6 years of trying. Of the approximate £900,000 cost, The Heritage Lottery Fund is providing over £700,000, English Heritage £80,000, and contributions from Lincolnshire County Council, and The European Regional Development Fund. The sticking point was the replacement of the cap and sails, which have been classed as "new works" and so are largely not covered by heritage funding guidelines. To address these, the Friends of Moulton Mill are fortunate to have contacted John Grimwood, chief executive of The Oldershaw Group (a local onion business), who was born in Moulton, and has lived there ever since. His business has agreed to provide bank guarantees which enable the final funds to be obtained from the Architectural Heritage Fund. Tenders have been sent out, and a contractor selected, and work is expected to start this month (Jan 2004).

The programme included a reprise of the series' original visit to the mill, with an interview with John Biggadike, the last miller. Janet Prescott of the Friends of Moulton Mill provided updated info, and John Grimwood was interviewed. Finally the computer simulation of the mill complete with sails was shown again, with the sails still rotating the wrong way round!
Mills: [Moulton]
See also:Item #182
Item: #193, Posted: 3/1/04.

Cricklepit Mill restoration funding

The restoration of Cricklepit Mill in Exeter is back on track after Exeter City Council agreed to provide an additional £35,000 to the project.

The foundations of the mill are dated to 1220, though the present building which dates from 1529 was badly damaged by fire in 1999. After an initial contribution of £45,000, the council also agreed to pay £55,000 when Devon Wildlife Trust, which is buying the building from the Guinness Trust, took over the mill. Since the plans were drawn up for this work, which includes restoring the waterwheels, costs have increased by £70,000, which will be split between the Council and the Trust.
Item: #192, Posted: 2/1/04.

Windmill damaged by high winds again - in 1839

William Lucas, a Quaker brewer in Hitchin, wrote about events, both local, national, and international, in his diary and reminiscences covering the 1830s-1860s. His coverage for 1839 noted that the high price of bread was causing unrest, and also that his father's windmill had been damaged yet again by high winds.
Item: #191, Posted: 1/1/04.

Wind turbines kill a few birds

Prompted by the article in the Houston Chronicle, which related that the 7000+ wind turbines in Altamont Pass have killed an estimated 22,000 birds in 20 years, the news and discussion site Slashdot ran a thread entitled Wind turbines kill a few birds. The title pretty much sums up the mood of the discussion, which is that turbines are not specifically dangerous to birds - far more birds die flying into glass windows for example, and other energy forms also kill birds in far greater numbers - notably motor cars, and oil spills from tankers.

Of course the glib comments don't tell the whole story, but I do rather think the original article is a non-news item. The overall number of birds killed is insignificant - a greater problem is where turbines are sited on migratory paths for specific species (where American eagles are always mentioned), where there may be a problem. In summary, it's necessary to consider bird flight patterns when siting the turbines, but not a reason to stop turbines altogether! Experience has also shown how to space rows of turbines so they kill less birds, and modern blades rotate slower than earlier models, so are less likely to hit birds anyway, and today's mono-towers are less attractive to birds than the early open lattice structures were.
Item: #190, Posted: 1/1/04.

Kite aerial photography of Altamont Pass

Aerial photography always makes for an unusual viewpoint, and as digital camera become smaller, lighter (and cheaper), the practicalities of suspending them from a kite become less. I've admired Charles Benton's Kite Aerial Photography site for a while, and just noticed he's added a number of pages of images of the wind turbines of Altamont Pass, California.

Previous photo series by the same photographer have included the Dutch windmill at the Western end of Golden Gate Park.
Item: #189, Posted: 1/1/04.

Review of 2003

I've been producing this news page for almost a full year now, so it's perhaps reasonable to provide a quick review of some of the notable items covered during the year.

Starting with the bad news, we lost two windmills in the UK this year - that of Chillenden lost to November's storms[#169], and that of Kenn simply to deliberate demolition[#165].

The good news included a good number of mills which got grants from the Heritage lottery fund[#84]. Other mills such as Brixton[#74] acquired new groups of friends, fighting for their preservation, and existing groups at Upminster[#111] and York[#44] gained charitable status, to help further their work. The BBC Restoration programme[#116] highlighted the need for money for restoration, and may have brought new money to the table.

The launch of the Mills Archive Online[#146] gave us a great resource for investigating historical aspects of mills, and a number of other interesting archives such as Viewfinder from English Heritage[#48], and British Pathe News[#155] came along with good mill inclusion. General search facilities at Google[#177] and Amazon.com[#145] also offered increased methods for tracking down information.

Wind energy was high in the news, with the UK government granting new licences for a number of offshore wind farms[#110] - and new turbines appeared onshore, including one just off the M25 at Kings Langley[#141], and even one temporarily installed on the South Bank[#167] in central London.

This site also went through considerable expansion, with the rounding out of the county coverage, and incorporation of the external collections from Peter Hedges and Mary McLauchlan. There's an increasing number of pages on watermills, and the windmill coverage also spread to more of the world, including The Netherlands, Spain, and The USA. There's also a number of other new subsidiary pages, such as supermarket, National Trust, and tallest windmills.
Item: #188, Posted: 31/12/03.

Ludlow plans to build a new watermill

The Dinham Green Millennium Trust have plans to spend £360,000 building a new watermill on the banks of the River Teme in Ludlow. The site once hosted a corn mill, and then an iron foundry, but more recently was occupied by a swimming pool, whose changing room building will be converted into the mill. The mill will include visitor facilities, and a tea room, and will use water power to generate electricity.
Item: #187, Posted: 30/12/03.

Footsteps photo archive

I've just stumbled across the small photo library of Footsteps. Of their several thousand images dating from about 1910 to 1930, they have put together a page of mills, currently with 17 watermills and 42 windmills illustrated. There is no info about each image given beyond the placename - the site exists to sell reproductions of the photos.
Item: #186, Posted: 29/12/03.

Newly available picture of Willowmoor Farm windmill, Redmond, USA

In my round-up of Mills of Washington State, USA I included the windmill shaped building at Marymoor Park, Redmond. In its current state, this building looks most unlike it was ever worked by wind. However, in the recently available King County Snapshots photo archive, there is a photo of the mill from the Clise Collection dating from when the area was still known as Willowmoor Farm. This photo shows the building much closer to the river, and with a far more lifelike pair of sails - which does add a bit more credence to the supposition that this was once used to pump water from the river.
Item: #185, Posted: 28/12/03.

Concorde's last flight, at Bristol

On 26th November 2003, Concorde made its last ever flight, when the final production model was flown home to its birthplace of Filton. On its flypast of Bristol, it overflew the Clifton suspension bridge, giving a spectacular photo opportunity. The resultant photo shows Concorde, the bridge, and crowds of people gathered to watch around the observatory on Clifton Down - the former windmill which was used for producing snuff.

Update: Although the quality is poor, you can see a video of Concorde flying over the bridge - it's about 3 and a half minutes into the broadcast.
Mills: [Clifton]
Item: #184, Posted: 26/12/03.

100 Greatest Musicals

Channel 4's 100 Greatest Musicals airs over the Christmas season. As part of this, they are running a competition to win DVDs, including the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Special edition - which of course features Ibstone windmill.

Update: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang came 11th in the poll - beaten by one place by another vaguely windmill themed film - Moulin Rouge with Nicole Kidman. The top musical was Grease.
Mills: [Ibstone]
Item: #183, Posted: 24/12/03.

Restoration: What happened next

On January 2nd 2004, BBC 2 will be broadcasting a follow-up to the Restoration series run in the late summer of 2003. This program considers all 30 buildings that were featured in the series, seeing how their individual campaigns for restoration have progressed.

The programme notes mention that "Moulton Windmill has triumphed ..., received a Heritage Lottery Fund grant and all that remains is to find the money to replace the sails. They have come up with an ingenious plan...". Lets hope that the BBC have corrected their graphic of the mill, which showed the sails turning backwards in the original programme in the series.
Mills: [Moulton]
See also:Item #116
Item: #182, Posted: 23/12/03.

Send an eCard

If you've left it too late to send your Christmas cards, perhaps you could send an eCard instead. There are plenty of mill images to choose from, though few are particularly seasonal. Amongst the selection are:

Item: #181, Posted: 22/12/03.

Hertboomwindmolen - Belgium windmill cam

The site for the Belgium windmill Hertboomwindmolen allows access to 4 webcams to give topical pictures of the mill. Of these webcam 2 gives the fullest picture, but also take a look at webcam 1, webcam 3, and webcam 4 (offline as I write this).
See also:Item #122
Item: #180, Posted: 22/12/03.

Christmas ornaments

Where celebrated, each country often has its own Christmas traditions. A speciality of some regions of Germany is the Christmas Pyramid which consists of a framework topped by a pinwheel windmill. Candles arranged around the frame give rising air to power the windmill, which rotates the ornaments in the framework. You can probably find a selection of such items for sale via Froogle (though being an American only site at present, there are limited imports available there compared to those available in Germany).

Windmills also appear on other Christmas ornaments - such as snowglobes.
Item: #179, Posted: 21/12/03.

Sarehole mill special Christmas openings

With its Tolkien connections, Sarehole Mill on the outskirts of Birmingham is opening as a special treat over the Christmas period.

Sarehole Mill will be open on 27th, 28th, 29th and 30th December between 10am and 3pm. It is one of the highlights of the re-launched Tolkien Trail round this area where Tolkien lived from 1896.
See also:Item #172
Item: #178, Posted: 18/12/03.

Google begins searching printed books

In the words of Google, "It turns out that not all the world's information is already on the Internet". To address this, Google have started to index extracts from books - often including the cover blurbs, which are a readily available approximate summary of the contents.

The books included in this initial batch number about 7000, and include both fiction and non-fiction books. See what shows up for windmill or watermill. Some of the books it shows up are expected, such as Devices and Desires by PD James, others are a surprise, such as The Complete War of the Worlds relating the furore this 1938 radio broadcast caused.

Update: It seems topical to relate that the extract from Lord Of the Rings is one including Sandyman, the Hobbiton miller.
Item: #177, Posted: 17/12/03.

Windmills on Stamps

The January 2004 issue of Gibbons Stamp Monthly has a article by Fred Atkins entitled "Windmills on Stamps". The article examines the development of windmills over the past 700 years and their representation on stamps.
Item: #176, Posted: 16/12/03.

Chillenden remains packed up for storage

The BBC has an update on Chillenden windmill, reporting that the millwrights IJP who worked on it recently are dismantling the remains, for storage until Kent County Council who own it decide its fate. The timbers are being carefully labelled, and will be dried out to keep rot at bay.
Mills: [Chillenden]
See also:Item #169
Item: #175, Posted: 15/12/03.

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