jsmoriss:

Our malt mill is an improvement on the basic Schmidling Maltmill kit. The mill came mounted on a press-wood base, and was designed to sit on a plastic bucket. Some brewers use a hand-drill to power the rollers, but we chose to bolt a 1/4 HP motor to the base instead. Since the original platform was too small, we also replaced the base and a made steel frame to hold the whole thing. The frame is constructed of 1" square steel tubing. It's outside diameters are 19 1/2" high x 16" wide x 17" deep. Leaving the front section open, we can easily slide in a bucket to accept the crushed grain.

The motor revolves at 1725 RPM and has a 3/4" machined spindle mounted on its shaft. A 7 1/2" pulley (from a washing machine) is fitted on one of the rollers. This combination gives us enough torque and speed to handle any grain in a very reasonable time.

When selecting a grain mill, there are a few important design characteristics you should consider. The gap between the rollers should be adjustable to mill different types of grain. As an example, Barley malt should be milled using a 0.035" (0.9mm) gap between the rollers and Wheat malt milled at 0.024" (0.6mm). If Wheat is milled too coarsely, the kernel will not crush sufficiently and your efficiency will suffer. A parallel adjustment, which the Schmidling Maltmill lacks, is also preferable for an even crush. A larger width and circumference will also help improve lautering by keeping more husk material intact.