Happy new year to everyone!
After a couple of weeks’ break over Christmas and the new year, restoration work on Brixton Windmill continued this week.
The brake wheel is now disengaged from the wallower (photo by Owen Llewellyn)
The brake wheel in the cap, which is driven by the sails, is now out of mesh with the wallower, which is essentially a very large cog wheel that transfers the energy from the wind shaft that comes in from the side to the vertical drive shaft. You can see a good diagram here that explains this. This means that once the sails of the windmill are reattached, they can turn without powering the main millstones.
On the main structure, Stone West have replaced eroded bricks on the ground floor interior and covered the metal strengthening bars with mortar. Work on the ground floor should be finished by early next week and will move up to the next floor.
The surface of the new bricks will be rubbed down to match the old ones before painting (photo by Owen Llewellyn)
With all the wet weather there is still concern about dampness in the floors and walls, and whether dehumidifiers will be needed to help dry out the interior before it is painted.
Brixton Windmill restoration blog 
It is good to read that despite all the cold weather and snow in December work is going ahead and refurbishment work looks on target to complete in good time.
The next site visit for Friends to view the restoration work is on Thursday January 27 in the afternoon. To put your name down for this visit email info@brixtonwindmill.org.uk
If you can’t make this site visit there is another one in February.