They Drop This Grindstone Into Place by Hand!

A seven-ton Neidenbach sandstone grindstone — 2.53 meters across — gets installed the old way, by hand, no machines. Watch the millwright and his crew lower it into the grinding pit, drive the iron arbor, true the stone, dress the face, and run it in before the first saw blade ever touches it. Every step matters: one chipped corner, one hidden crack, and the whole stone can blow apart at speed. Once it's running clean, the slide bench goes back to work burnishing large frame saw blades — the same process that's been done here since before 1900, and still done with natural stone because nothing else gives the finish these saws need. Original source material: Schleifsteinhngen und Schleifen von Sgen in der Schleiferei Wolf und Bangert Published by Alltagskulturen im Rheinland © LVR-Institut für Landeskunde und Regionalgeschichte CC BY 4.0