Vintage Windmill and Wind Generator Forum

Michael , i looks like you need to go out to the "Heritage Farm " in north west Waco and teach / show off some of your skills .
They have an interesting set-up out there

That's a really good job! I'm impressed.

tower looks great

Thank you.

The literature I have on the Parish reflects they sold a 24’ tower with the girts appearing to be on the outside of the main angle. So mine is 1/2 scale-ish.

I erected the Parish yesterday. I still need to adjust the brake/main vane on a day with little to no wind as the main vane will not drop from horizontal (when off) to completely vertical (when on) when the brake is disengaged. It drops about 3/4 the way. The literature says the brake came “preset” and it likely did decades back. I made a few upgrades, or at least what I perceive as upgrades.

Additional photos.

Parish literature says they made an optional vane counterweight. Anyone ever seen one?

Interesting mill! I always hoped maybe I could find one around here, we have an amazing variety of mills. Not yet though. I had read somewhere that when they first came out, the had straight sails, but later they rolled them. also, sides vanes were optional I think. ....? Never heard anyuthing about a counter weight. A little difficult to understand the operation by the pictures. Great pictures though. My favorite color! Looks great!

Very nice workmanship Michael, very nice Mill.!!

Thank you.

Windy - It is possible the smaller side vane was optional, but the literature I have doesn’t show it as optional. Only the “counter weight balance” reflects as optional. Mine lacked both a side vane and side vane pipe and several I have seen photos of in the wild, all lack side vanes. However all had the side vane pipe “holder” welded to the angle iron head to accept the side vane pipe. My guess was that the side vanes may have been poorly secured, damaged and or just lost over time.

It operates as follows:
Upon engaging the brake, the forks rotate up. This causes the brake in the hub to cause friction and simultaneously the main vane rotates from vertical to horizontal. Both the brake and main vane are on the same pipe stem, so they operate together under one action. Once the main vane is horizontal, the smaller side vane (which is vertical) then takes over all lateral movement of the entire head. Think of it as, if you flipped an Aermotor vane from its designed vertical position, which causes it to spin and into the wind to that of horizontal, where that same (horizontal) Aermotor vane would be useless in combination with the rotation/position of the mast pipe cup, etc.

Here are a few more photos. Some might be repeats, but they help explain what I’m trying to relay above.