Rehabilitation of a hydraulic mill
published: 19/06/18, 23:21
Hello everybody
I am new to this forum and I am also fortunate to be a new owner of a small mill with a water right.
Ce forum is a mine of passionate information that I have devoured lately.
However, I did not find all the information I was looking for, or rather, there is too much to be sorted out for my case, which is why I allow myself to open a new thread.
The site has a lot of assets to reduce our energy dependence. Without talking about autonomy.
To put it simply, we hung up on the purchase of the mill, which means that all the work and development will be done on a short-term basis over a long time but especially as much as possible in self-construction with good ideas easily achievable. . This does not mean, however, not to have a prospective and global vision.
I intend to make the most of the energy potential of the site, but I also feel like I'm missing out on some of them. I ask the most advanced of you to tell me what they think
It is an old agricultural mill on the edge of a small mountain stream (Puy de Dome) with 1 hectares of rugged terrain bordering wooded areas. The mill was still active until the end of the 80 years. He exploited only the hydraulic force. At the death of the last miller, his descendants were largely transformed into a dwelling. So getting rid of most machines and mechanisms. The water circuit has never stopped working and is intact. It feeds on the one hand a water hole with a forced pipe diameter 200 mm where there was a horizontal turbine which rotated an oil wheel and secondly a augers wheel that propelled a grinding wheel. There is neither the horizontal turbine nor the wheel. Only the oil mill remained in place as well as the shaft and the wooden gears. For the rest it is a jumble of gables, lanterns and straps that make up a giant puzzle to reconstruct. A cable connected to the electric meter had been installed by the former owner to produce electricity through a turbine that he wanted to install in the water chamber. The project has remained at the idea stage. The mill is located in the cellar of the current dwelling.
As far as hydrometry is concerned, last December I calculated a flow rate of 90l / s and 3m50 of waterfall. This represents a theoretical power of 3Kw. A turbine coupled to a generator can theoretically provide 2,6 kwh continuously.
hydraulic
My intention is to produce electricity in self-consumption, at first to heat the sanitary water. A transformer will surely come later to extend the electricity production to the entire consumption of the house. Being careful, I can at least run a washing machine if I do not light a toaster at the same time.
What about surplus electricity?
Rather than unnecessarily heating an already hot water heater I thought to evacuate the surplus of the networks by heating a network of secondary water to heat a greenhouse with a cooling basin before returning the water in the river. We are in a mountain area and keeping certain crops frozen would be a blessing. By cons the summer we heat what?
Then there remains an unexploited potential which is that of the kinetic energy of the second waterfall. Is it possible to exploit it without having to rebuild a wheel? I searched and found no answers.
I intend ultimately to be able to mechanics to re-exploit the mechanical energy. Traditionnellent energy was used to grind or beat plants to make all kinds of things. Or to operate machines such as sawmills.
I did not find any other applications that would be useful to me and I got into the idea of installing a Dutch battery to make paper made from chanvree and other vegetables that I can grow. If anyone has an idea of genius that he has proposed.
I thought it might be interesting also to use the water to drive a hydrolic motor that would turn the old oil grinder again. Does anyone already have experience with this type of mechanics?
Heating
The river being very cold in the winter, I gave up the water / air heat pump. Being in a forest area and having plots of wood at my disposal, biomass seemed to me to be the best option. The main heating will be provided by a wood stove with heat storage, combution logs / pellets. In a second time I thought to install a boiler on the stove (optional) to heat the parts of the houses that will not benefit from thermal diffusion with a heated floor. There would still be a lot to do and say in terms of insulation to improve the heat balance. This may be the subject of another topic.
If anyone has any suggestions in general, I am prenneur. Even though I am more and more interested in all his subjects, I feel more able to write a poem than to calculate a load power. A lot of things have probably not come to my eyes yet.
Last but not least, if anyone is interested in doing experiments in my small open-air laboratory, I'm open to the idea.
I am new to this forum and I am also fortunate to be a new owner of a small mill with a water right.
Ce forum is a mine of passionate information that I have devoured lately.
However, I did not find all the information I was looking for, or rather, there is too much to be sorted out for my case, which is why I allow myself to open a new thread.
The site has a lot of assets to reduce our energy dependence. Without talking about autonomy.
To put it simply, we hung up on the purchase of the mill, which means that all the work and development will be done on a short-term basis over a long time but especially as much as possible in self-construction with good ideas easily achievable. . This does not mean, however, not to have a prospective and global vision.
I intend to make the most of the energy potential of the site, but I also feel like I'm missing out on some of them. I ask the most advanced of you to tell me what they think
It is an old agricultural mill on the edge of a small mountain stream (Puy de Dome) with 1 hectares of rugged terrain bordering wooded areas. The mill was still active until the end of the 80 years. He exploited only the hydraulic force. At the death of the last miller, his descendants were largely transformed into a dwelling. So getting rid of most machines and mechanisms. The water circuit has never stopped working and is intact. It feeds on the one hand a water hole with a forced pipe diameter 200 mm where there was a horizontal turbine which rotated an oil wheel and secondly a augers wheel that propelled a grinding wheel. There is neither the horizontal turbine nor the wheel. Only the oil mill remained in place as well as the shaft and the wooden gears. For the rest it is a jumble of gables, lanterns and straps that make up a giant puzzle to reconstruct. A cable connected to the electric meter had been installed by the former owner to produce electricity through a turbine that he wanted to install in the water chamber. The project has remained at the idea stage. The mill is located in the cellar of the current dwelling.
As far as hydrometry is concerned, last December I calculated a flow rate of 90l / s and 3m50 of waterfall. This represents a theoretical power of 3Kw. A turbine coupled to a generator can theoretically provide 2,6 kwh continuously.
hydraulic
My intention is to produce electricity in self-consumption, at first to heat the sanitary water. A transformer will surely come later to extend the electricity production to the entire consumption of the house. Being careful, I can at least run a washing machine if I do not light a toaster at the same time.
What about surplus electricity?
Rather than unnecessarily heating an already hot water heater I thought to evacuate the surplus of the networks by heating a network of secondary water to heat a greenhouse with a cooling basin before returning the water in the river. We are in a mountain area and keeping certain crops frozen would be a blessing. By cons the summer we heat what?
Then there remains an unexploited potential which is that of the kinetic energy of the second waterfall. Is it possible to exploit it without having to rebuild a wheel? I searched and found no answers.
I intend ultimately to be able to mechanics to re-exploit the mechanical energy. Traditionnellent energy was used to grind or beat plants to make all kinds of things. Or to operate machines such as sawmills.
I did not find any other applications that would be useful to me and I got into the idea of installing a Dutch battery to make paper made from chanvree and other vegetables that I can grow. If anyone has an idea of genius that he has proposed.
I thought it might be interesting also to use the water to drive a hydrolic motor that would turn the old oil grinder again. Does anyone already have experience with this type of mechanics?
Heating
The river being very cold in the winter, I gave up the water / air heat pump. Being in a forest area and having plots of wood at my disposal, biomass seemed to me to be the best option. The main heating will be provided by a wood stove with heat storage, combution logs / pellets. In a second time I thought to install a boiler on the stove (optional) to heat the parts of the houses that will not benefit from thermal diffusion with a heated floor. There would still be a lot to do and say in terms of insulation to improve the heat balance. This may be the subject of another topic.
If anyone has any suggestions in general, I am prenneur. Even though I am more and more interested in all his subjects, I feel more able to write a poem than to calculate a load power. A lot of things have probably not come to my eyes yet.
Last but not least, if anyone is interested in doing experiments in my small open-air laboratory, I'm open to the idea.