Built of red brick this windmill now has two pairs of sails of the patent shutter type, when the windmill was built in about 1816 they would have been cloth adjusted from the outer staging that has been removed at some time.

Now standing amidst domestic residences it is one of three windmills that stood proudly on what was once Stock Common the two others where both post mills and where demolished in or around 1900, due to a program of restoration overseen by the County Millwright during 1991-1993 it is now a workable windmill and is open to the public on many weekends throughout the year.

It would have once been winded (tuned into the wind (Luffing)) by the miller using a chain attached to a large pulley, however, it later had a fantail fitted so the wind could do this for him. It was standing on the platform of this fantail that I first got the real experience of height and movement at the same time, awesome.

A small item in a local paper inspired me to visit this mill. This was also a new era for me as I now owned a Video Camera and was itching to try it out on historic buildings and this windmill seemed just right for the job.

It was a dry but dull afternoon when I arrived but I was soon videoing the outside, when this was completed I entered the mill to view it. It was manned by a small group of volunteers that were very helpful, on asking if I could video inside I was amazed at the reply I got. " of course you can, it could be here today and gone tomorrow, like most windmills. " I was informed of the many different events that could destroy them. More about this later.

I was advised to start from the top and work down as this would represent the true chain of events. I climbed the set of steep narrow stairs until I got to the highest most solid floor of the mill, this is called the dust floor and the floor below this is where the grain bins would be for holding the raw grain that would be pulled up in sacks by the sack hoist through a series of trapdoors built into each floor.

Unlike at Bocking I had no sense of insecurity on this floor even with the amount of visitors that were on it, unlike Post Mills Tower mills are of a solid structure up to this point.

Above me was the Cap holding its gigantic gear wheel known as the Brake Wheel, it was held in place by the thick Windshaft that passed through is centre, this in turn was secured to the Cap with a tail bearing at its end and another just prior to its exit from the cap, the remainder of the shaft protruded out to be turned by the sails.

A lot of the workings were obscured by the lattice work of heavy beams that made up the base of the cap, however, I started to take some video and to my amazement I was asked if I would like go up into the cap, that is the very top of the windmills internal height an offer I could not refuse.

I had to agree that I would do this at my own risk which I did and a few seconds later a ladder was produced and soon put into use. Clambering over the beams was more difficult than I had thought but do it I did, it was no wonder that visitors were not usually given access to this part of the windmill.

I could now see how the cap was attached and the gear train that turned it. I could see the air gap between the cap and the tower and realized how fragile the connection between to two parts were. My next subject was the fantail or fly.

The Fantail protrudes from the rear of the cap on a small platform in the case of Stock tower mill this was made of a heavy gauge mesh as opposed to boarding as used on other windmills , looking down through this I was quite uneasy, it was while doing this that a slight wind turned the fantail, only slightly, but seeing the ground move beneath me was not a pleasant experience. I regained my sanity and returned to the floor below and started my journey down through the mill.

Stock was built to drive two pairs of stones and in 1890 a extra pair were added. The mill was adapted to run all three pairs by moving them all to the next lower floor that was strengthened to hold all the weight.

The huge Drive Shaft that ran down the centre of the tower was driven by a large but smaller gear than the brake wheel that it meshed with on a horizontal plane, The Brake Wheel was about 9% off of vertical. Many other auxiliary gears would be used for driving the sack hoist and dressers etc.

Another large gear called The Great Spur Wheel was attached to the drive shaft this would drive the smaller gears, these could be meshed with it at will by the Miller either to drive any one pair of stones or all of them at the same time. These gears are called Stone Nuts, the smaller shafts these turned would pass into the centre ( the Eye) of the Runner Stone (The top one of the pair and the only one that revolved) to drive it around.