old heavy duty grain mill

[Chad Keven]

I found this old grain mill and scored it free, I'm willing to spend a bit on it to reinstate it. I already have a  motor and pulley so thats a start. the issues are with the rollers, they are about 100mm in diameter do they need to be knurled? or are they big enough to not need it? they are not knurled which suggests that they dont need to be, but that said it could have been used for larger grains ie corn? at a chicken farm or somthing?

I am planning to have the rollers nickel plated at an electro plating place and line the inside with sheet SS, the rest will be stripped and re painted and covered with a SS guard and hopper.

does anyone have know how with somthing like this? thanks in advance, any advice helpful.

[Chad Keven]

Thanks I'll have another crack at it today maybe

[Chad Keven]

The motor that was stuffed was about 1300rpm the motor I hope to put on is about 1420 or something does anyone know how this will affect my crush and roller speed?

[martin w]

what are the dimensions of the rollers and the V-groove drive wheels? that extra rpm when geared down i'm guessing would cause minimal difference in roller speed and no difference in crush

[Chad Keven]

Yeah I'll just have to try it aye, off topic but have you ever mill ed wheat and baked bread ?

[Crusader-Rob]

Thats an additional 2 revs per second at a 1:1 direct drive, looks like a belt driven motor. The ratio drive ratio of the wheels will help.

[Chad Keven]

for those who might be interested, Ive been busy cleaning up this rusty old junk, and I have discovered the joys of electrolysis to remove the surface rust.

1. You get a large bucket or plastic container
2. put steel rods inside like rebar wire these to the sides of the bucket with copper wire. i used 4 pieces of rebar
3. connect these rods with copper wire
4. half or 3/4 fill the bucket the bucket with water, add 1 Table spoon of baking soda per 3.5l water
5. place a piece of wood across the top of bucket with a wire hook hanging off it
6. get the rusty thing you want to clean and hang from the wire hook with wire
7. get a 12v car battery charger and connect the positive aligator clip to the anodes (copper wire connecting the rods)
8. connect the negative aligator clip to the wire that your rusty part is hanging from

you will notice a fizzing on the surface of the metal this is hydrogen and oxygen rising to the surface (do well ventilated!) in around 6-10 hours the rust is mostly gone leaving fairly clean steel behind, that is a bit blackend.

this has cost me nothing except for baking soda and some power, the rest was lying around the house

check it here

photos to follow

[Eddie Johannisson]

I am quite new to brewing and I love making my own stuff so this looks like a fun project. Would love to get my hands on something like that. It would be nice to see the photos.

If you want to keep the rust away there is an anti-corrosion spray we use in the marine industry that works great and it is food safe. It is called CorrosionX.

[Chad Keven]

thanks for the tip Eddie, I'll keep it in mind, All my nuts bolts, chain etc are oiled at the moment but when I put it all back together and I know it works properly I want to de grease the nuts and bolt heads and paint, assuming I wont have to un-do anything, should look ok I'll post some photos

[Chad Keven]

Boom! Nearly finished

[Grant R Baker]

The hat is off... nice job there.