How to motorize my little ark grain mill (restel) with a bicycle any plan or suggestion ?

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I have a hand mill-grain named little ark from Retsel corporation and would like to motorize it by a bicycle so to use less effort.

-- Nasseri (ibmcc@colba.net), September 08, 1999

Answers

That's a tough one. My not so technical suggestion rests with the fact that I bought a clothes wringer that has a large wheel on the end that can have a belt or whatever run around it to a bicycle wheel and have pedal power! You would have to anchor the mill really well and find a wheel somehwere and attach it. Never done it myself, but thought I would throw it out incase something clicks for you. Hope it helps.

-- Sammie Davis (sammie0nospam@hotmail.com), September 08, 1999.

This may be an alternative. I have a the same brand mill, but its 35 years old and much bigger. It has a 3/4 motor on it but the motor can be removed and a handle put on. The handle is about 3 ft long so you can really crank out the flour with minimum effort. If you don't have a long handle, perhaps you can modify it. I once ground flour in Central America with a bicycle and let me tell you, it wasn't easy. I think that if you choose the bike route, you will find that you will have to put some gears in the system to make it easier. Just my two cents worth.

Taz

-- Taz (Tassie@aol.com), September 08, 1999.


Finally I made it myself.

-- Nasseri (ibmcc@colba.net), September 23, 1999.

I have the same mill.

I have not assembled it yet, but my solution was to buy a $5 stationary bike at a yard sale. I will mount it to a platform with a belt drive from the big wheel to a smaller one on the mill. I'll keep the mill's pulley fairly large to keep the leverage up and reduce the effort.

Biggest obstacle so far is the big wheel on the bike. It's SOLID hard rubber. How to put a belt around that? I decided I'm going to sharpen a lathe tool and get my kid to spin that wheel up to speed while I reshape it into a solid hard rubber pulley with a groove to match a drive belt. This outa be FUN! Watch the stuff fly!

-- Art Welling (artw@lancnews.infi.net), September 24, 1999.


Oh,

and I plan on adding about 5 pounds of lead weights to the big wheel to get that 'flywheel' effect going better. I have the lead, just need to wrap it around the spokes.

-- Art Welling (artw@lancnews.infi.net), September 24, 1999.



hi

my sellsman told me that the mills has to run slow he gave a sheet to me how to motorize it with an eclectic motor (it is written to pass bye by 16" pulley on the mill shaft to reduce the mill from 1725 to 150 rpm required. The mill should turn at 150 rpm or less I think bicycle flying wheel like you plan to make will run faster that and it is a problem and the stone could be damaged. We are going to fix a gear on the mill shaft with a modified bicycle.

-- Nasseri (ibmcc@colba.net), September 25, 1999.


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