Baker/Heller Aller Model 28

[sshosier]

I just recently picked up this windmill head complete with the wheel and tail. Everything has a nice rusty "patina". It just so happened that I already had the top 10' of a Heller Aller tower to put this on. At one time someone had gutted the gear box and added a sprocket to drive an alternator to charge some batteries. Since I was already missing everything from the gearbox I've decided to just just make this a decorative "spinner" windmill to put up at our farm house. I'm going to leave everything rusty as well.

So far I cleaned up most of it. Replaced the mast pipe, straightened out the blades and did a few other repairs. I have added two bearings inside the gear box and the shaft seems to spin really nice. I left the original snout bearing in place so I don't think I'll have any issues with things being balanced. My plan is to put this up next week.

I'm extending the 10' tower I have to around 20' tall. It seems to me like the legs on this tower don't have very much spread or angle on them. From what I have mocked up at 20' tall it only has around 30" square at the base. Is this normal for a HA tower? Should the legs be splayed out at the bottom? Any suggestions on what is a good height for a decorative tower with an 8' wheel? I have all the material to go as tall as I want including all of the original ladder steps.

Right now the only thing I'm missing is the hood cap.

[windybob]

Have a lot of good stuff to work with! Nice!

You can make the tower wider by moving the girts up higher, spreading it out more. Normally a 20 ft tower has about a 6 ft Diagonal spread at the bottom. To keep the esthetics nice, with an 8 ft mill, an 8 ft diagonal spread is not unreasonable.