Tochmaland is a smock mill in Kollum

Kollum

Kollum is a village in Kollumerland c.a. in the province Friesland of the Netherlands and has a population of around 5613 . There is a restored windmill, Tochmaland in the village.-References:...

, 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 was built in 1893. The mill has been restored to working order. It 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 23743.

History

Tochmaland was built in to drain the 550 hectares (1,359.1 acre) Tochmaland polder

Polder

A polder is a low-lying tract of land enclosed by embankments known as dikes, that forms an artificial hydrological entity, meaning it has no connection with outside water other than through manually-operated devices...

. It was originally the sawmill

Sawmill

A sawmill is a facility where logs are cut into boards.-Sawmill process:A sawmill's basic operation is much like those of hundreds of years ago; a log enters on one end and dimensional lumber exits on the other end....

 Welgelegen, Veendam

Veendam

Veendam is a municipality and a town in the northeastern Dutch province of Groningen.A Holland America Line cruise ship, the MS Veendam, is named after the city.- Population centres :...

, 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...

. The mill was moved by 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...

 J B Donders of Tilburg

Tilburg

Tilburg is a landlocked municipality and a city in the Netherlands, located in the southern province of Noord-Brabant.Tilburg municipality also includes the villages of Berkel-Enschot and Udenhout....

, Noord-Brabant, who had quoted a lower price for the move than millwrights from Kollum.It was formerly fitted with four Patent sails. The mill ceased working in 1946 when the windshaft broke and repair was deemed too expensive. A brick shed containing an electrically driven Archimedes screw was erected next to the mill.

A proposal to demolish the mill was rejected by the mayor of the gemeente Kollumerland en Nieuwkruisland. 0n 30 December 1948, the mill was purchased by the gemeente. Restorations were undertaken in 1949, 1963 and 1983. since 1995, an electric motor has been installed in Tochmaland to drive its Archimedes screw, and the installation in the brick shed demolished.

Description

Tochmaland is what the Dutch describe as an Grondzeiler. It is a two storey smock mill on a single storey base. There is no stage, the sails reaching down almost to ground level. The mill is winded by tailpole and winch. The smock and cap are thatched. The sails are Common sails. They have a span of 23.54 metre. The sails are carried on a cast iron windshaft which was cast by H J Koning, Foxham, Groningen, in 1912. The windshaft also carries the brake wheel which has 63 cogs. This drives the wallower (33 cogs) at the top of the upright shaft. At the bottom of the upright shaft is the crown wheel, which has 44 cogs drives a gearwheel with 41 cogs on the axle of the Archimedes screw. The axle of the Archimedes screw is 445 millimetre diameter. The screw is 1.63 metre diameter and 5.5 metre long. It is inclined at 19½°. Each revolution of the screw lifts 1347 litres (296.3 imp gal) of water.