De Mûnts is a smock mill in Buitenpost

Buitenpost

Buitenpost is a town in north-east Friesland in the Netherlands.It lies approximately halfway between the cities of Leeuwarden and Groningen, in the northern part of the municipality of Achtkarspelen...

, Friesland

Friesland

Friesland is a province in the north of the Netherlands and part of the ancient region of Frisia.Until the end of 1996, the province bore Friesland as its official name. In 1997 this Dutch name lost its official status to the Frisian Fryslân...

, Netherlands

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

 which has been restored to working order. The mill is listed as a Rijksmonument

Rijksmonument

A rijksmonument is a National Heritage Site of the Netherlands, listed by the agency Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed acting for the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.-History and criteria:...

, number 7039.

History

This mill was built in 1870 at Oosterhoogebrug, Groningen

Groningen (province)

Groningen [] is the northeasternmost province of the Netherlands. In the east it borders the German state of Niedersachsen , in the south Drenthe, in the west Friesland and in the north the Wadden Sea...

, where it drained the Borgsloterpolder in connection with the construction of the Eemskanal. It was demolished in 1952. In 1958, millwright

Millwright

A millwright is a craftsman or tradesman engaged with the construction and maintenance of machinery.Early millwrights were specialist carpenters who erected machines used in agriculture, food processing and processing lumber and paper...

 A de Roos of Leeuwarden started to rebuild the mill at Buitenpost for Wolter O Bakker of Harkstede

Harkstede

Harkstede is a small village in Slochteren, Groningen , the Netherlands. Its name is "Haarkstee" in the local dialect, the Gronings. The name is probably meant as "Arkes Stee", which means "pleace for a ark = church". Harkstede has about 3000 inhabitants, what makes it one of the smaller villages...

. This was completed in 1959. Repairs and restoration were carried out in 1963 and 1973. In 1985, the inner sailstock, which was made of wood, broke. It was replaced by an iron one by millwright Buurma of Oudeschans, Groningen. In 1990, the outer sailstock was also replaced with an iron on by Buurma. Further restoration work was carried out on the mill in 1994.

Description

De Mûnts is what the Dutch describe as an "achtkante grondzeiler". It is a smock mill winded by a winch. There is no stage, the sails reaching almost to the ground. The mill has a single storey brick base and a three storey smock. The smock and cap are thatched. The four Common sails have a span of 13.4 metre and are carried in a wooden windshaft. The windshaft also carries the brake wheel, which has 37 cogs. This drives the wallower (19 cogs) at the top of the upright shaft. At the bottom of the upright shaft, the crown wheel (28 cogs) drives the wooden Archimedes screw via a gear wheel with 29 cogs. The Archimedes screw has an axle diameter of 210 millimetres (8¼ in) and is 650 millimetre diameter overall. It is inclined at an angle of 15°. Each revolution of the screw lifts 106 litres (23.3 imp gal) of water.