Vintage Windmill and Wind Generator Forum

Working on resurrecting an 8' Star 24 mill. I have the wheel but no wheel arms or wheel arm braces (just angle iron i reccon). I have a copy of the parts diagram from here and thought I could estimate the wheel arm dimensions from it. So, I wrote a little computer program in Matlab to digitize the diagram and then predict the arm dimensions. Since I have several F&W rudders (tail vanes), I measured the middle dimension lengths of them at 50.0 inches. This gives me an accurate scaling factor for anything in the diagram.

Then I asked my mouse to pick points on the wheel arm braces in the picture and then calculated their approximate lengths. They come up 34 and 32 inches which is always nice to get whole numbers.

Before I cut any steel, does this jive with any of you having F&W wheel arms lying around ? I have a Star 26 behind the barn with the same wheel layout, but the outside temperature is 14 degrees and that's too cold for me to climb a ladder or drag out the man-lift and go up there to measure. If any of you need any information like this I can help you with it. Straight or curved pieces, no problem.

Wow Bill that's amazing you can do stuff like that. I'm impressed. Maybe someday we could have an interesting conversation about quantum theory. lol

Bill: I can measure tomorrow and get some measurements to you. Send me a P.M. with best way to contact you. Todd

Bill, I made a sketch of 8 ft Star 24 wheel arms.
If I remember, it ha about 4 different pcs.
If I can find it, I will post it tomorrow.

Kenneth

Bill, this is the sketch I made up from an original arm.
It has a lot going on but you should be able to get the
Dimensions you need to make a set of arms.
Hope this helps.

Matlab huh? Bill, you must be a mechanical or aerospace engineer.

Yep. And Windmilling IS rocket science. And I see people with very unique and special talents who can handle these restoration and maintenance jobs. My experience with Erector Sets as a kid started me off down this highway..

Many thanks to you Ken. Off to the steel supply company in Brighton tomorrow.

No problem Bill. Glad I could help.

Kenneth