Kev Alviti takes inspiration for his latest project from the history of milling
Bread is a huge staple in our house. I am obsessed with having fresh bread, so either my wife or I bake most days (the children honestly have no idea how spoilt they are). I’ve also messed about with growing small patches of heritage grains, with aspirations of milling it for our own flour (and the actuality of feeding a lot of greedy squirrels a few days before it was quite ready to harvest).
But of course, growing the grain is only one step of the process. It also needs to be harvested, threshed, winnowed and then milled. We have a small hand-cranked grain mill, but I’ve often wondered if I could make something myself and how complex or simple I could make one that would work. The effort involved of milling flour by hand has long been forgotten.
That’s when I stumbled upon an online museum, The Mills Archive Trust, which is trying to preserve the history of milling. The website showed a simple wooden mill, made from three parts. The team at the Trust were so helpful with my list of questions.
Apparently, these grain mills were incredibly common at one point in history. It was standard equipment carried by the Swedish military in the 30-year war from 1618 to 1648 and in campaigns in Russia from 1778 to 1779. Obviously, not that many have survived until this time, and having multiple bits to them, finding complete sets is hard.
I’m guessing that having a mill and being issued grain rather than flour meant that it would travel and store better (flour can get damp and go bad quickly). It also meant that grains and seeds could be foraged and added to rations. From a much earlier point in history, ‘Tollund Man’ is a 2,500-year-old mummified remains of a man, found in a peat bog in Bjældskovdal, Denmark, who had porridge with 40 different types of seeds in his stomach! Most people now couldn’t name 40 plants let alone forage the seeds from edible ones, but it gives an idea that there was plenty to add to it.
The flour would have been quite coarsely ground I imagine, and made into an unleavened bread or dough, or maybe just baked on hot coals in the fire. The time and effort to mill using one of these would be far more than anything we’re used to.
The original mill was made from birch, a hard timber that would have been abundant in Sweden (it’s their third most common tree). For my project, I struggled to find any birch that had been milled locally but instead found some beech that my friend had milled some years back and stored in an old abandoned swimming pool. It’s a similar hardness, but a little heavier, which is no problem as I don’t intend on carrying it around as part of my kit!
You will need
Saw for dimensioning the blank
Mitre saw
Sander
Lathe
Bandsaw
Planer-thicknesser (optional)
Hand plane
Bowl gouge
Skew chisel
Spindle roughing gouge
Parting tool
Scraper
18mm chisel
Mallet
Antique wooden mill from The Mills Archive Trust collectionPhotographs courtesy of The Mill Archive Trust
Hand grain mill plan
Preparing the timber
1. The timber I used for this had been stored in an abandoned swimming pool. Unfortunately, the roof had a slight leak right over the stack of wood and it had also had some woodworm attacking it. It was very much at the ‘use it or lose it’ stage of timber storage as it wouldn’t keep like this forever. My friend was pleased for me to use some of it and we plan to use the rest to make him a workbench2. The beech was slabbed up at 65mm thick. Having a small workshop can make it difficult to dimension timber like this. I used my cordless chainsaw (wearingfull PPE) to cross-cut it, then used my track saw, taking multiple passes to break it down further, working from both sides to rip it3. Mark up the pieces you need: a long piece for the trough, a 125mm disc for the wheel and a 225mm piece for the handle. Cut the disc blank roughly to round on the bandsaw4. Using the planer-thicknesser, square up two sides of the other two pieces of beech before running them through the thicknesser. Obviously, this could be done by hand plane if you don’t have those tools. The blank for the handle needs to be square to fit through the disc later in the project
Turning the wheel and handle
5. Mount the round beech blank on the lathe; I used a four-prong drive centre to make sure it was well mounted. Beech is a hard wood so I had to make sure it was well seated6. Due to the grain direction, I used a large bowl gouge to make this round7. Using the bowl gouge again, rough out a tenon on the back to fit the chuck8. Cut a template to check the tenon is the right size for the jaws of your chuck. You can use the skew chisel to make any minor adjustments and to dovetail this tenon if your jaws call for it9. Remount the blank on the lathe using the chuck. Start the lathe again and true it round, roughly sizing it to 125mm. At this point, I could see I had a patch of tricky grain to deal with when I stopped the lathe to inspect it10. To deal with this I took light cuts with a round-nose scraper. This doesn’t need to be perfect as the wheel will get bruised when it is pushed against the grains for milling11. In the tailstock, mount a Jacobs chuck with a 25mm Forstner bit. Work this bit through the blank so it’s deeper than the 32mm you need the wheel to be. This can be quite tough on the drill bit so take it slow and clear it often; the application of some wax on the bit can make it easier to cut12. Mark 32mm in from the end and then start to cut this with a parting tool. Cut wider than the tool to reduce the risk of it overheating and binding up. Slow and steady with lots of clearing the tool is ideal; you can finish parting it off the lathe with a saw if you’re more comfortable doing that. Try to keep the cut as straight as possible, but remember you can sand it afterwards should you need to13. Now turn the handle. Make sure the blank is as centred as possible as that will affect how it goes through the wheel. Mark the centre section that will stay square (this is the part that will be mortised into the wheel)14. Use the spindle roughing gouge to rough down the round sections of the handles15. Take the skew chisel and, using the point, cut into the line that will form the shoulders between the square and round section16. Using the skew, cut up to this shoulder, making small passes so as not to cut too much at once. Then use the skew to smooth the rest of the round sections at the handle17. Use the skew again to round off the ends, maintaining contact with the cutting edge and rolling it round the curve. Sand up if it needs it. There’s no real reason to have this super smooth, in fact a little grip might be a good thing18. Use a narrow parting tool to reduce down both ends, then with a strong one-handed grip on the tool, use the other hand to catch it as it’s cut from the lathe19. Insert the handle through the wheel; use a marking knife (I tend to just use a sharp Stanley knife) to mark the square section of the handle on the wheel20. Use an 18mm chisel to cut the shoulders. Make the cuts from one side so far, then mark the round section of the handle as a witness mark to line it up, insert it through and mark the shoulders from the other side21. Finish the cuts from the other side. Doing it this way prevents breakout and helps keep it square22. Keep this joint as tight as possible – it’s better to be too tight than too loose. Remove small amounts and test for fit regularly
Making the trough
23. Mark up the block of beech for the trough. Mark out the depth of the waste on the side so it’s easily visible. Make sure it’s not deeper than the wheel will be able to go. Make sure this piece is over long to give yourself extra wood for clamping and to prevent splitting as you work on it24. There are lots of ways of removing the waste. My mortiser was in pieces and out of action, so I used my Festool Domino XL, which is perfect for removing large quantities of waste. A pillar drill and Forstner bit would be equally as good25. Remove the bulk of the waste, making sure you step the ends to allow for the angle26. Tidy up and slope the sides with a mallet and chisel27. Take care when working on the sides; it would be very easy to go too heavy with the chisel and split it28. Check the wheel fits in the trough and make sure the curves of the trough match that of the wheel29. Mark up the trough to show the waste then cut the ends square and cut 45° on the end30. Chamfer the 45° corners using a plane31. Sand the whole trough. Use sandpaper by hand on the inside and then an electric sander on the outside to smooth and ease all the sharp edges. I chose not to treat the mill with any oil or preservative at the moment, preferring instead to use it and see what happens as it gets rubbed and worn, with flour worked into the grain
The hand grain will in use
32. The second you use this mill it’s obvious that it works, and it’s also obvious that milling with it is not a fast process! This is a job many won’t be used to
I only had whole wheat berries to try it with, which might have been too hard; it’s a modern grain variety, so not like the grains this mill would have originally been designed for. It cracked these grains and did produce a coarse flour, but I wonder how it would do with something like rye or some hull-less oats. I questioned the design of the wheel and handle at first, with the handle being mortised into the wheel rather than just being drilled. It is more work to do this, but this gives you such purchase when pushing and turning the wheel, allowing it to slide at first to crack the grains then the handle is easy to turn as it rolls across them. If it was just into a round hole it would soon start to slip.
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