Pedal Power...

The pile of materials needed for a pedal powered grain mill: scrap lumber, POS old cruiser bike named Ashley, and of course a grain mill.

Joel doing some figuring.

The finished product sort of. The tiny little 6 inch pulley was replaced later with a larger 10 inch pulley. By making the swap to the bigger pulley the speed at which the grain mill pulley spun was almost doubled. With the addition of a bigger chainring on the bike the, 44t to 52t, the grinding efficiency will be phenomenal. We hope.

Joel doing some grinding and working up a sweat.

In operation.

Flour anyone?

This project has been in the works for sometime. I have slowly been collecting bicycle related materials for it for about a year. I have had the bike, a Huffy Corvair, for quite sometime. I was going to restore it back to its original grandeur but that never happened. The chain we used was a donation from my neighbors garage door opener. The cog is a fixed cog that was originally designed to be used on the straight rear axle of an adult tricycle. Joel supplied all the lumber, the pulleys and belts, the grain mill, and the most important part the brain power. The pulleys and belts were all purchased locally from a varity of hardware stores. We did quite a bit of shopping, swapping and returning of said pulleys and belts trying to find the most effiecent combination. We ended up settling on a ten inch drive pulley paired with the sixteen inch grain mill pulley. The bike is sporting a 44t chainring, soon to replaced with a 52t, and a 24t cog.

All and all everything turned out pretty well for our first pedal powered appliance contraption. It still needs some fine tuning, some cartridge bearing and such, but it works, works well and is more effecient than handcranking the mill. Next up a peddle powered thresher!

THE REVOLUTION WILL BE PEDAL POWERED!!!!

peace, JOEY.