My Ugly Junk- Corona Mill Station...

[djt17]

About these corona mills... Can they be used to make flour at home? My wife is wanting something to crack flax seeds and also wants to grind her own flour.

When I purchased mine from Amazon, all the negative reviews were from people trying to make finely ground flour.

 

[JoeyChopps]

Well I stand corrected. I thought he could pull it off. Hopefully he didn't buy one on my crappy advise.

 

[Huaco]

Well I stand corrected. I thought he could pull it off. Hopefully he didn't buy one on my crappy advise.

Nope... thought I would wait out a few other responses first. Hmm... I may need to rethink this plan. Maybe this mill for cracking flax seed and an actual grain mill for making flour.
Thanks for all the replies guys...

 

[Revvy]

Corona mills are really corn grinders, not grain mills...I think you can make corn tortillas, but "gold medal" type flour is doubtful. Flour mills usually use a stone for a very fine grind.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/18963/corona-mill-and-tortillas

Yeah, you can actually buy the stones that fit on them,

Sunshine Corona Stone Conversion Kit

Turn that old Corona mill you bought into a quality Stone Flour Mill

The regular Corona Mill is fine for grinding course cereal; however, if you desire to grind fine flour and get it the first time through, you need our Sunshine Corona Stone Conversion Kit.

The kit includes everything you need to turn your regular Corona into the finest stone hand mill, capable of grinding your grains, like wheat, into the finest, lightest flour you can produce. Think about it – no more running your grain through the mill five times and still ending up with a coarse cereal.

You may purchase the stones only, and use the mill with the original auger, but we recommend that you also purchase the optional Modified Auger. The Modified Auger has been engineered to provide just the right feeding rate for the finer grinding milling stones. Using your old (unmodified) auger will make your mill much harder to turn.

With the Sunshine Corona Stone Conversion Kit, it’s like having two mills in one. Leave your mill as it is and you have a steel burr for grinding course cereal or any soft, oily grains or beans. Or change it to the stone burrs, which will allow you to grind fine flour in one pass.

 

[AnchorBock]

Should have my Discount Tommy mill this week, I'll get some pics up when it's done. Leaning towards a two bucket with some type of hopper extension, just not sure what yet.

 

[jerrodm]

Thanks for posting that link Revvy, I had no idea this existed. Has anyone tried out this stone conversion kit? My wife would love to grind flour with the corona mill.

 

[Huaco]

Nice... I might be buying 2 corona mills pretty soon then. One for my wife with the retro-fit stones. And one for me to crush grains with! haha!

 

[loud1]

Hey Revvy, Love the "Buddy Jesus" avatar.

 

[Revvy]

Hey Revvy, Love the "Buddy Jesus" avatar.

Thanks, I loved the movie Dogma. It was funny though, I found the pic when I was actually looking for something serious about spirituality and beer, the quotes by Martin Luther and other early church leaders as quoted in the book "The search for god an guinness" and this popped up in a blog referencing those quotes.

 

[BBBF]

Thanks for posting that link Revvy, I had no idea this existed. Has anyone tried out this stone conversion kit? My wife would love to grind flour with the corona mill.

I have half of the stone conversion kit on a mill I pieced together from two broken mills. The bigger/flat/part that turns is the stone part and the flour it makes is definately finner.

 

[tre9er]

I'm going to have to try this. I've been worried about too much flour, however I'm getting too many batches in the 50ish percentage range.

Thanks for the update.

As long as you have some amount of pieces that are large enough to accumulate and form a filter bed, it's fine. Might have to vorlauf a little more but IDK, mine runs clear after a few quarts at most.

 

[Haputanlas]

As long as you have some amount of pieces that are large enough to accumulate and form a filter bed, it's fine. Might have to vorlauf a little more but IDK, mine runs clear after a few quarts at most.

Thanks. I also have tons of extra rice hulls and can use them if needed.

 

[mforsman]

Could you guys evaluate yet another crush?

Thanks!

 

[JoeyChopps]

The pic may be screwing me up but I think I see a few whole kernels I would go a touch finer IMO

 

[Haputanlas]

I think you're right. This looks a lot like my more recent crushes and I've been getting in the 50s-60s


I see what looks like at least 4 or 5 whole

 

[mforsman]

Thanks guys, I tightened it up and kept cranking. Looks better to me! The key was that one side of mine was creating much finer particles, I put an additional washer on that side (one on the left, two on the right)

 

[rico567]

I agree with the other posters- the pic provided shows a crush that has too many big chunks in it, with what looks like a few whole grains. For my mill, I just followed the advice of 'wilserbrewer': tighten until you're scared, then tighten a bit more. I did that, and my OGs fell right into line.

 

[tre9er]

Could you guys evaluate yet another crush?

Thanks!

tighten that baby down! Don't fear the flour!

 

[Anguslow]

Here is my setup. I get some grain sneaking out of the top of the shroud, and some dust, so I will likely add some sort of metal shroud that covers the entire top of the grinding plates.

Also getting some uncrushed grains, so will tighten down and see how that works.

$14.95 for the mill (local Mexican supermarket)
$4.50 for the wood (Home Depot)
$1 for the metal (leftovers from a previous project)
$4 for the downspout (Home Depot)
$3 for the driver (Home Depot)

$27.45 total. Not bad for a mill.

 

[MMJfan]

Angus, that's way to pretty to be considered 'Ugly Junk'...

 

[jerrodm]

Gawd that's pretty. I really should do something like that.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Here is my setup. I get some grain sneaking out of the top of the shroud, and some dust, so I will likely add some sort of metal shroud that covers the entire top of the grinding plates.

Also getting some uncrushed grains, so will tighten down and see how that works.

$14.95 for the mill (local Mexican supermarket)
$4.50 for the wood (Home Depot)
$1 for the metal (leftovers from a previous project)
$4 for the downspout (Home Depot)
$3 for the driver (Home Depot)

$27.45 total. Not bad for a mill.

Interesting, never thought of checking a local mexican supermarket for a mill...theres a large hispanic population here so i have no doubt i could find one locally instead of online.

 

[AnchorBock]

Got my mill put together and a 2 bucket design set up - I'll post a pic of it once I figure out a hopper. In the meantime - please evaluate my crush, seems a bit shredded - it's 2-Row:

 

[tre9er]

Looks pretty good, mine is finer though, for reference. If you find a single uncrushed (or only slightly cracked but still in-tact) grain, tighten it more. Remember, you're not trying to get every single grain to be cracked with the entire husk in-tact, you're just trying to make sure you have SOME husks there to filter the rest.

 

[AnchorBock]

Looks pretty good, mine is finer though, for reference. If you find a single uncrushed (or only slightly cracked but still in-tact) grain, tighten it more. Remember, you're not trying to get every single grain to be cracked with the entire husk in-tact, you're just trying to make sure you have SOME husks there to filter the rest.

Thanks - that makes sense. I BIAB so I'm not really worried about a filter bed so I'll tighten it up a bit more and post a pic later.

 

[AnchorBock]

Thanks - that makes sense. I BIAB so I'm not really worried about a filter bed so I'll tighten it up a bit more and post a pic later.

Ok - here it is tightened up slightly - what do you think:

Thanks

 

[Stauffbier]

Ok - here it is tightened up slightly - what do you think:

Thanks

You could probably still tighten that baby up a "CH"!


So.. Anywho..

Here you go boys and girls...

Here's my junk in action! I'm brewing a little ol' 1.5 gallon batch of "All Simcoe" tomorrow!

 

[BeardedIdiot]

Ok - here it is tightened up slightly - what do you think:

Thanks

If you're BIAB'ing, tighten 'er up even more! I do BIAB, and I tightened it down till everything is well crushed, and there's a bit of flour in it.

With BIAB, you don't need to worry about the crush creating a good filter bed, because the bag is doing it for you.

 

[kinison_fan]

Picked up my first full sack of grain on Saturday. Had it in the back hatch while running errands, and was greeted by the sweet, malty smell everytime I got in the car: best.airfreshener.ever.

 

[jerrodm]

So Anguslow's pic finally got me off my a$$ to set up my grain mill with a nice bucket-and-cover. Believe it or not I've used it for several years by just clamping it on the counter and grinding into a bowl. But no longer--I built it on Saturday and tried it out on Sunday, it worked great. Pics to follow when I get home tonight.