Miss Minnie's Mill Restoration Begins

Last week, I started the restoration of a 14" Nordyke and Marmon Stone Buhr Mill. This mill belongs to the Anderson Mill Garden Club. Since I was elected chairman of the Memorial Board last year, I have been involved in a number of restoration projects for the club. The first was the replacement of the 16 foot water wheel seen here. Our intent is to connect the Nordyke mill to this waterwheel eventually using it to grind corn for our scholarship program.

The age of the Nordyke Mill is not known to me. It has a patent date of August 1st, 1870. It is the smallest of the three shown here in this catalog page ~1920. It came with a additional feature called a bolter that was used to sift the ground grain.

It ran at about 1000 RPM according to this document. and needed ~3hp at that speed. We think it was powered by a 6HP 450 RPM Fairbanks Morse Flywheel Engine that is being restored by Alan Null at Diversified Machining in Bertram, Texas.

The link below will take you to the Picasa Image Archive for this project.

https://picasaweb.google.com/AndersonMillGardeners/NordykeMarmonRestoration

The mill was in remarkably good condition for its age. Minnie Anderson used this mill presumably to grind corn between 1923 and 1945. It was fitted with a homemade hopper extension that allowed the operator to load a larger amount of grain. 

It is also a "mostly" complete assembly. The only missing part I have noticed is the sifter/bolter attachment. Hopefully, I can talk my friend into making a replacement.

There was some damage and a subsequent repair to the main steel support frame. This weld repair appears on both sides of the frame.

Additionally, the wooden skids that contact the floor had significant insect damage and were rotten. One of the short corner posts was completely detached from the floor skid member.