Vintage Windmill and Wind Generator Forum

I was just in Lubbock a couple weeks ago, I hadn't thought about it but I don't remember seeing one, that would make a great piece to hang on the wall down there but you are right, that is pretty steep for a section. On a related note, I did take a very rotted L Monitor down once that every single blade was wrapped with electric motor winding wire and twisted tight. Looked like a lot of work and the copper was the only thing that still had a trace of paint but I am sure it beefed them up.

When I was around 10 yrs old I worked for this German farmer for a couple years who was very thrifty and I can remember him using strips of oil soaked leather to take up the slack on wore out bushings on his farm equipment. One of my jobs was to keep everything greased.

J Frank Dobie devoted an entire chapter to rawhide use in his book "The Longhorns" (University of Texas Press).

It is no surprise that it would be used for windmill repair...........it was used for EVERYTHING.

It held Texas together.

mtblah wrote: ↑Mon Mar 20, 2023 5:54 pm Another fine example of the suburban house wife decorating their walls and ruining the windmill trade .

Agreed. I always give my in laws grief about this because they have a couple sections on their wall.

Lot of uses for leather and ingenuity as well.

Little off topic, but still involving leather and windmills is leather shims. The leather shims on this open gear windmill, when I took it down last year were largely intact (i.e. petrified leather), so I cut new ones.

I probably shouldn't tell this because everyone will think I'm a shade tree mechanic. I used shims cut from a plastic coffee can when I put my Woondmase back together. They did what I wanted.

Don't worry Wayne. If the windmill police ever find out some of the things I've done, I will never see the light of day again.

You guys are funny.

I’ve made thrust washers out of a blue barrel lid. A plastic washer was the thrust washer on the turntable on a Parish…ended up replacing that aged thrust washer with an oil impregnated thrust washer.

Leather is a remarkable material. It was used as a gasket material for liquid oxygen fittings in the early nasa x1 program. I once built a liquid nitrogen (-320F) container out of an entire cowhide because it’s tough and remains flexible at cryogenic temps. Those cows evolved to survive. Where they screwed up is tasting so good to us humans.

Leather was the native Indians best friend.!!!