Woodworker Builds a Windmill That Was Originally Designed by Leonardo da Vinci

Andy George of How to Make Everything built a windmill that was originally designed by Leonardo da Vinci. It took a bit of work to get it to spin, and George found that he needed to freewheel the sails a bit, as there were no directions available.

The next major challenge is going to be the actual sails which spin the windmill and for that DaVinci really doesn’t give us much guidance. I’ve seen a lot of different interpretations of different ways his sails may have been intended, but his drawing is very vague, so it went back and forth between a few different designs. Between things more directly inspired by Da Vinci versus kind of the the style used by most wooden windmills.

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