This mill is listed as “an unusually complete example of a C19 timber-framed and weatherboarded estate saw mill believed to retain most of its machinery.”
https://britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/300008680-llwydiarth-saw-mill-banwy#.XZkQSJNKiQ4.
I was interested since it was powered by a water turbine (cool things) and I hadn’t seen a saw mill before.
The building is not in good shape despite some attempt at restoration in the 1980s - one end has collapsed and part of the the first floor is sagging.
It's situated in a loop in the River Vrynwy, with water travelling along a channel (leat) from a weir upstream as shown in the 1887 map below.
The water then heads off across fields back to the river.
Rear view with some fallen trees on the roof - the water ran down the channel in the middle…
…and then down through the turbine, exiting on both sides.
The turbine is said to be by Gilbert and Gilkes (numbered 1871 and purchased 1907), but I couldn’t find a makers stamp; it may have been on the missing bolted-on top section where the water entered.
However it certainly looks like a Gilkes - below is a picture of a similar one https://millsarchive.org/explore/glossary/articles/entry/turbines/13196.
While the details are different the control mechanism for the guide vanes is much the same.
Modern Francis-type turbines with adjustable guide vanes feeding a central rotor are an evolution of this type of design although the rotor is horizontal and water only exits on one side (down).
Detail of a guide vane and the 1871 stamp.
The vanes were adjusted from within the mill by a wheel on the first floor linked to the control shaft by a worm and curved rack.
The turbine drove this main shaft…
…which had belts to the saw mechanism in in the middle of the mill (the turbine shaft is at the far end in this picture).
Views from both ends of the bottom of the saw frame, the left one showing the crank which moved the sash containing the blades up and down.
Top of the saw frame. Logs were mounted in the horizontal rectangular carriage which was wound past the blades.
Details of the carriage with a rack attached to the underside running on wheels (top), and the racheted wheel (‘ragwheel’) which drove it with two pawls.
The carriage drive wheel would also have been water powered, although the details were hard to decipher.
Some aspect of the process was also controllable from outside - the lever still moves a piece of wood in and out (this emerges next to the carriage).
A link to a very short video of a sawmill in Norway which shows a water-powered multiple blade saw (gang saw) in action.
https://britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/300008680-llwydiarth-saw-mill-banwy#.XZkQSJNKiQ4.
I was interested since it was powered by a water turbine (cool things) and I hadn’t seen a saw mill before.
The building is not in good shape despite some attempt at restoration in the 1980s - one end has collapsed and part of the the first floor is sagging.
It's situated in a loop in the River Vrynwy, with water travelling along a channel (leat) from a weir upstream as shown in the 1887 map below.
The water then heads off across fields back to the river.
Rear view with some fallen trees on the roof - the water ran down the channel in the middle…
…and then down through the turbine, exiting on both sides.
The turbine is said to be by Gilbert and Gilkes (numbered 1871 and purchased 1907), but I couldn’t find a makers stamp; it may have been on the missing bolted-on top section where the water entered.
However it certainly looks like a Gilkes - below is a picture of a similar one https://millsarchive.org/explore/glossary/articles/entry/turbines/13196.
While the details are different the control mechanism for the guide vanes is much the same.
Modern Francis-type turbines with adjustable guide vanes feeding a central rotor are an evolution of this type of design although the rotor is horizontal and water only exits on one side (down).
Detail of a guide vane and the 1871 stamp.
The vanes were adjusted from within the mill by a wheel on the first floor linked to the control shaft by a worm and curved rack.
The turbine drove this main shaft…
…which had belts to the saw mechanism in in the middle of the mill (the turbine shaft is at the far end in this picture).
Views from both ends of the bottom of the saw frame, the left one showing the crank which moved the sash containing the blades up and down.
Top of the saw frame. Logs were mounted in the horizontal rectangular carriage which was wound past the blades.
Details of the carriage with a rack attached to the underside running on wheels (top), and the racheted wheel (‘ragwheel’) which drove it with two pawls.
The carriage drive wheel would also have been water powered, although the details were hard to decipher.
Some aspect of the process was also controllable from outside - the lever still moves a piece of wood in and out (this emerges next to the carriage).
A link to a very short video of a sawmill in Norway which shows a water-powered multiple blade saw (gang saw) in action.
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