Commercial Items Identified on my Commute

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I see a lot of interesting commercialitems on truck on I-75. When you make the commute many times you start to see the same items over and over again. Sometimes it is huge equipment tires, sometimes heavy equipment of different types. I see these huge blocks of aluminum going North. I think about what the mill must look like and where it is going. And how much aluminum foil a block like this will make. Using the Tesla Full Self-Driving (supervised) allows me to look for these things on the highway. The FSD also helps me through the crazy stop and goes. Easily over 70MPH and then sudden traffic at dead stops, frequently. I see accidents every trip. It is amazing there aren't more. A side note- aluminum foil has a shiny side and a dull side. The reason why is that the foil is folded as it goes through massive rollers. The shiny side is the side that faces the steel roller. The dull side faces itself - aluminum.
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Solon NY Water Mill

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I went and looked at the Solon Pond Mill. I was mistaken last time when I was up there in 2000. It was Summer and everything was overgrown. The mill is about an 1/8 mile from the building I thought might have been the mill. The mill is in rough shape. But everything is still there. I couldn't get underneath to see if the turbine was in good shape. I had heard that it was buried in muck. I suspect it is there, but probably in rough shape as well. It is a combination grist and saw mill, and could be restored to do exactly that. I am going to pass. I was thinking it would make a great homesite however. There is 3.9 acres (a lot for a mill) and you could build a nice house that looked period and work on getting an awesome water powered workshop out back. There is a planner, and it looks like a jig saw and I bet a few other pieces of woodworking equipment in there. All the shafting looks good. It is fun to think about the coolness of starting with logs and making furniture all out in that small mill with water power alone. The grist mill looked almost pristine. The floor has fallen through in an area of the shop above the creek.

The roof has fallen in over a portion of the sawmill. Definately a handyman special. The seller said that he had the design to rebuild the dam using precast. I thought that was a great idea. The mill pond is approximately 1/2 acre in size. There are lots of trees that would have to come down both in the pond and around the mill. They are too looming and destructive. One of the neat things is that the mill is right over the creek. It would look great restored, or at least functional. In the photos you will see a log of the grist mill tonnage over different years written in pencil on one of the belt ways.

More photos (self serve)

Comments

Anonymous said…
Hey,
Very neat... man it would take 3-4 hours to get that thing cleaned up and working, huh!
GM
10:53 AM
Anonymous said…
It is actually "do-able". I can't help myself figuring out how to fix the structure without getting killed, drowned, collaping the entire structure or all three!

Thinking about this project helped me get more interested in the structure issues on my own barn.

I do think it would be awesome to have this water powered wood shop, over a creek out behind the house. It is set up to start from logs. I suspect they made fruit crates or something like that.

Someone is going to fix this place. I think it would be fun to help figure out what to jack, pull, push, lift, pry, nudge, swear, roll, and break to get the place back in shape.

Charlie
1:41 PM
Anonymous said…
Thanks Charles for your posting. There may be a group of people after all that could be interested in banding ( or would that be belting ) together to do something with this. My email is cboeres@twcny.rr.com. I hope to have more info for you by way of the Cortland Historical society. Thanks, Chris.
5:07 PM
Anonymous said…
Couldn't be any worse than the house on Brownsville Rd...
10:35 AM
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