La Cotte Watermill

It seems the original Millstones fell and broke in the fire. I took this photo 12 years ago. Luckily, along with the parts from the Mill which we have now discovered came from Cradock in the Eastern Cape nearly 800 km away, was a pair of matching stones, of a much lighter shade. They are 'monolithic', that is one-piece, but the rough back of both has been filled up with Plaster-of-Paris or similar material. The balance-rynd was missing from the runner. I had one made and rather than setting it in with lead or Sulphur, I opted for Epidermix, a strong epoxy resin. The slot in the stone and the new rynd needed some fettling to fit centrally and level. I masked it and poured the resin and left it to harden. The balance-point can be seen in the picture above. If it doesn't balance on this, I'll have to add weights to the top. Where the resin didn't reach, I later tipped the stone up first on one side, then the other and poured more in, again allowing several days to hard...

 Deon Roux, the builder we have approached to work on the tail-race, solved a mystery! We knew his father had carried out the restoration of the building in 1989, but the bomb-shell he dropped was that he himself collected all the loose parts we'd found in the attic! He also informed us that they came from an already dismantled Mill in Cradock, almost 800 km away from La Cotte. He knew that the (rather flimsy) Hurstings and remains of a water-wheel were badly worm/beetle-eaten. The remaining parts seem remarkably free of damage.  The Pit-wheel didn't look too impressive when we found it lying in the attic, although interesting in that it has four spokes and five cants. It was one of the first parts which Jon took away to his workshop in Maitland. He cleaned it up, made three new cogs, copying one of the better ones, and discovered the cants are lovely honey-coloured Yellowwood! It seems expertly made and surrounded by a heavy wrought-iron band. The disappointment was that the ...