The Mill

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Summer 2012 Building Activities

We haven't added to the blog in quite a while but we HAVE been busy rebuilding the Mill!
We've added a tractor and tractor barn to keep the rain and snow off the tractor during the winter months.

That's a 1942 Cat D-2 Tractor with a gas pony motor and a pull start. It's a bitch to start up the gas engine and you'd better not let it die when trying to get it to start the diesel engine.

And we got the first part of the decking put down on the first of 6 sections, 25' wide x 16' long.

Here's the rest of that section with decking put on top. The beams and posts are all made from lumber milled on the property from trees cut from the property, just like 100 years ago!

Those long boards underneath were very helpful when we were laying down the decking! But they had to go...

And that tin is rescued from the old structure. It's original stuff. I added that to the uphill side to keep the rain and mud from getting under the new structure and back filling it. It would be a big mess to try to dig out this summer (2013).

Here's a shot of the lumber yard as it stands in late summer or fall of 2012:

And here's the depleted log deck:

Summer 2013 is almost here, and I'm ready to get back to work!
~Terry

Sunday, July 31, 2011

De-Reconstructing Part 2

We had a great time at the Mill July 22-24, 2011! Tim Sr, Terry and Tim Jr (on Sunday) worked hard to clear out the old site a little more and then start to build the new Mill from the ground up.

We played with blocks just like when we were little kids.

The first block is in place. That little block weights about 80lbs, fresh cut and full of water!

We installed the first foundation bean and it was as doozy! This beam is also fresh cut and weights an estimated 800 lbs! We moved it with muscle, roller logs, heavy breaker-bars and of course, the peavey!

And, here's a definition of terms, just so you know what we're talking about:

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

De-Constructing The Mill (Part 1)

Hard working brothers:

Hard working Father and Son:

Tim and Tim have been working hard on digging out the old Mill so that we can reconstruct the original structure. It's taking a lot of investigative work to figure out how the original Mill was constructed. We have old photographs but there's nothing like seeing it pulled apart to determine how to put it back as close to the original design as possible. When we get to the roof it will be anybody's guess but the foundation is there and getting dug out for the next several weeks.
Terry was there this last weekend to help with the digging and de-construction too!

This is the flume side of the Mill below what was the log deck. The log deck is where raw logs got rolled into the Mill for sawing into various sized boards:

Above this are two shots of the timbers underneath the log deck and saw. The 'V' shaped flume was under there as well to carry sawdust out of the way and up into the sawdust pile on the far side of the entrance road.

This is a shot of where we dug out just past the log deck into the Mill next to where the old saw was located.

Here's Tim and Tim digging out the rest of the footings across from the log deck. We cleared out about 27 feet of foundation under the log deck this weekend. But all of that old rotten wood needs to be cleared away and new beams will be put in place during the re-build!