In 1971 the old Georgian three story mill buildings and the associated miller's house were demolished as part of a road widening scheme.  The road widening did not take place as originally planned, so the High Wycombe Society undertook some restoration of the mill and its machinery.

The present, much smaller, mill building was designed by a High Wycombe Society member, Colin Kennedy, originally to preserve the machinery remaining from demolition.  A significant donation of funds from Marks & Spencer, to celebrate their centenary in 1984, together with concerted fundraising by the Society, enabled the building to be put up.   Of course, once the building existed it needed to be filled!  (See restoration.) 

The previous mill had the traditional three floors, whereas the present building has only two.  The top floor was a grain store.  Sacks of grain were hauled up by a sack hoist and stored until needed.  Subsequent movement of grain was as much as possible by gravity.  In the present mill grain is still stored on the top floor, but in bins close to the mill stones.

The mill is powered by a cast iron breast shot water wheel. A breast shot wheel is one where the water feeds into the wheel at around the level of the shaft, as opposed to an overshot wheel where the water falls from above onto the wheel, or undershot where the water flows below the wheel. The wheel was manufactured by a foundry in Lane End, and was installed in about 1860.

Water to turn the wheel is provided by closing a sluice gate on the river immediately upstream of the mill to divert the river and raise it by approximately 600mm (2 ft). A second sluice gate, controlled by the miller, is then opened to direct water into the wheel to make it turn.

The water wheel is approximately 5 metres in diameter, and has 48 buckets around its edge. When operating it turns at about 5 revolutions per minute, and it is believed that the wheel generates approximately 7 horse power.

The water wheel turns a large cast iron wheel in the mill called the pit wheel. Pann mill is unusual as the shaft of the waterwheel is higher than the shaft of the pit wheel so they are coupled through two cast iron gear wheels. The pit wheel is fitted with 60 oak teeth, called cogs, and these mesh with a smaller pinion called the wallower.

Although most of the machinery in the mill is made from iron, the cogs (teeth) are generally wood. This is because the wood is more easily replaced than iron, so wear and tear are easily remedied by replacing individual cogs rather than a whole wheel.  Wooden cogs are also quieter and there is no danger of sparks.

The water wheel, pit wheel and wallower shaft and the brick wall behind them are all that survives from the Georgian mill demolished in 1971.

A modern drive belt transfers power from the wallower shaft to a second shaft, the spur shaft. The spur shaft turns the stone shaft, and with it the grinding stone on the floor above.

The spur shaft and associated machinery, and the timber hurst frame in which they are mounted are not original to Pann Mill, but were from an old Oxfordshire farm mill where they were driven by a steam engine.

Mill stones are on the first floor, or "stone floor" of the mill . The stones work in pairs, one above the other - the lower stone, or "bedstone", is fixed, and the upper stone, or "runner stone", rotates, driven by the water wheel.

The millstones in use are French burr stone, and were made by a London firm, Dell and Company, in about 1920. They are not original to Pann Mill, but they are similar in size and type to those which were used here.

Burr stone millstones are made from of pieces of stone cut to fit together and held in place by steel bands clamped around the edge of the mill stone.  They are very hard and produce fine flour.

Mill stones were also made of a single piece of stone, for example millstone grit from Derbyshire, or a concrete composite. The millstone on display alongside the working stones is a composite, and the stone outside the entrance to the mill house is a single piece stone.

Mill furniture is the name given to the parts of the mill which feed the grain into the grindstones.

   The hopper stores the grain ready for grinding

   The shoe sits below the hopper and feeds grain from the hopper into the centre of the stones.

   The damsel turns with the wheel and vibrates the shoe to move the grain along.

   The horse supports the hopper, the shoe, and the damsel

   The tun encloses the grind stones to collect the flour as it is produced.

Other than the hopper all of the mill furniture are modern copies of original items.

The miller controls three main aspects of the grinding process -the speed of the water wheel; the gap between the grind stones; and the amount of grain being fed into the centre of the stones.

   • The sluice gate can be raised or lowered to regulate the amount of water spilling onto the water wheel, and therefore the speed of the wheel.

   • The runner stone can be raised or lowered to change the gap between the grind stones.

   • The angle of the shoe can be changed to control how much grain is failing into the grind stones.

Each of these has an effect on the others, and the miller's job is to co-ordinate all three to produce flour at the correct quality and rate.

Pann Mill restoration is a voluntary project - our only income is donations and the sale of flour.

Please buy some flour, or donate as much as you can to enable this project to continue.

We plan to construct a workshop in which to keep and restore more grain and flour sorting machinery for demonstration and display.

Restoration work takes place on the 1st and 3rd Sundays of each month, 9.30am - 1pm. If you are interested in joining the restoration team please contact Robert Turner on 01494 472981

The mill is open for public display in May, July and September.

If you have any questions, or would like to offer help or sponsorship, please feel free to e-mail the Project Manager at enquiries@pannmill.org.uk .

The High Wycombe Society - www.highwycombesociety.org.uk Registered charity No 257897

Honorary Secretary: Francis Presland, 61 Hicks Farm Rise, High Wycombe, Bucks, HP13 7SX 01494 523263