Friston Post Mill

Friston Post Mill

A post mill built in 1812 by John Collins, millwright of Ipswich. The mill was raised by the addition of a taller brick roundhouse and altered around 1872 by Joshua Reynolds, with maintenance and structural work undertaken in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

The building comprises a red brick, two-storey roundhouse surmounted by a three-storey, timber-framed buck clad with weatherboard.

The roundhouse, constructed around 1872, is built in red brick laid in Flemish bond with iron strapping around its circumference. The conical roof has a late 20th-century waterproof covering. Ground floor entrances on the north-east and south-west sides have boarded doors, and a boarded taking-in door is positioned on the first floor of the south-east side. Six-over-six sash windows punctuate the roundhouse walls.

The timber-framed buck is clad with replaced weatherboarding and has an arched roof form. The breast, or front wall of the buck is curved, with a cast-iron canister for the sail-stocks projecting at a high level. Windows are located on the north-east, south-west and south-east elevations in its current static position. An entrance door with a projecting arched hood is accessed from steps to the south-east, dating to the 1870s when the buck was raised. A new fantail was constructed at this time to automatically turn the buck to face the wind. The steps are joined by horizontal timbers to the fantail structure, which is in poor condition, though the shafts, gearing, bearings and wheels remain in place. The main sails, fantail blades and the wooden track around the roundhouse on which the fantail wheels ran no longer survive. Some of the shutters to the main sails, patented by William Cubitt, and the iron rods and linkages which controlled them, are understood to be stored on site.

Interior

The roundhouse walls have regular curved piers supporting a trestle comprising two cross trees and four quarter bars which support the main post. These timbers probably date to 1812 and are finely crafted and detailed. The last wooden desk or till is attached to the wall at ground floor level of the roundhouse.

The buck originally housed three pairs of stones, none of which remain on site. Some of the studs, posts and braces are well finished on the side and tail frame at each level, many neatly chamfered with run-out stops. A good proportion of timbers are probably original, though there has been piecemeal renewal; the floor frames appear to retain early 19th-century timbers. Much machinery remains, including the cast-iron windshaft, tail wheel, two upright shafts and two great spur wheels. The wooden brake-wheel and brake are intact. The final drive to the head stones survives in the mill but is not in situ.

On the lowest level of the buck is the post, strapped with iron to prevent the wood from splitting and fitted with a greased bearing on top, surmounted by the crown tree. Above is the millstone floor, where the position of the stones is apparent. A system of pulleys and chutes enabling the corn and flour to be processed remains in place. The tail-wheel and wallower to the tail stones, the drive shafts and the flour dresser remain. At the third floor, the windshaft taking power from the sails carries the brake-wheel and has a belt drive to the sack hoist. Three intact bins on the second floor fed the stones below.