Windmills
Build a windmill layer by layer. Pick a Dutch mill, a tjasker, a mill from La Mancha or Greece, a watermill or a modern wind turbine, give the body a tapering shape and turn the sails to any angle. Click blocks you have placed to keep track of where you are.
Shape
Waterwheel
Sails
Dutch mills have 4; Greek mills 6 to 12.
Turn the sails, the wheel or the rotor: 0 is straight up.
Wind farm
Real wind farms use 5 to 7 D.
Details
Front view: you look straight at the sails, the arc shows the angle of sail 1. Side view: the front on the left. Click a layer to view it on the right.
Build breakdown
Per layer, from bottom to top
Body width = how wide the octagon is on that layer. Click a layer to view it.
| Layer | Body | Parts | Blocks |
|---|
Build stages
Build from the bottom up: first the plinth and the body, then the stage, the cap, and last the sails and the tail pole.
| Part | Layers | Blocks |
|---|
Build tips
- First put a pole on the axis up to the height of the sails. You measure the body, the cap and the sails from it.
- Build the sails flat on the ground and then move them into place with WorldEdit or a scaffold. That is much easier than high up in the air.
- A thatched body works well with dark wood or hay bales. A brick tower mill looks good with bricks and a dark cap.
- Pick a slightly different sail angle for every mill when you build several. Then they look as if they are turning.
- The miller stands on the stage to set the sails. So let the sails end just above the stage.
3D and layer-by-layer build plan
To Minecraft
Download the design as a schematic file and paste it into your world with WorldEdit, or rebuild it from a hologram in Litematica. The block you choose is the body; the other parts have a fixed block.
Shopping list
Add the amounts of this design to your list. There you see everything together, converted to stacks and shulker boxes.
How it is calculated
History and fun facts
First water, then wind
Watermills are older than windmills. The Romans already used water wheels to grind grain. The Domesday Book of 1086 lists more than five thousand watermills in England.
With an undershot wheel the water flows underneath the wheel. With an overshot wheel the water falls from a channel above into buckets, which gives more power.
The post mill
Windmills appeared in Europe in the twelfth century. The oldest type is the post mill: a wooden body on one thick post. The miller turned the whole body into the wind with a long tail pole.
Later came the hollow post mill. Here only the top part turns on a post and the base stays in place. It was used a lot to drain polders.
Smock mills and polders
In a smock mill or tower mill only the cap with the sails turns. The body can then be large and tall, made of wood with thatch or of stone. A tall mill between houses got a stage, a walkway around it from where the miller could set the sails.
In the Netherlands mills pumped the water out of the polders. Jan Leeghwater drained the Beemster in 1612 with dozens of mills. Small drainage mills, like the spider mill and the Frisian tjasker with an Archimedes screw, did the same for one piece of land.
Mills in other countries
In Spain, white round mills with a cone shaped cap stand on the hills of La Mancha. They are famous from the book Don Quixote, in which the hero fights windmills because he thinks they are giants.
On Greek islands such as Mykonos there are round stone mills with 6 to 12 triangular cloth sails.
From mill to wind turbine
With the steam engine and later electricity many mills disappeared. Today the wind is used again by modern wind turbines with three blades, which make electricity.
In a wind farm the turbines stand far apart, often several times the rotor diameter, so they do not take each other's wind.
Where can you still see them?
At Kinderdijk nineteen mills from the eighteenth century stand together. The Zaanse Schans and the De Gooyer mill in Amsterdam are also well known. About 1,200 mills are still standing in the Netherlands.
In Spain you can visit the mills of Consuegra and Campo de Criptana, and in Greece the mills of Mykonos.
Did you know?
- The mills of Kinderdijk have been on the UNESCO World Heritage list since 1997.
- The craft of the miller has been on the UNESCO list of intangible heritage since 2017.
- On National Mill Day in May many Dutch mills are open to visitors.
- Millers used the position of the sails to send messages, such as mourning or celebration.
- Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes was published in 1605.
- A Dutch windmill almost always turns anticlockwise, seen from the front.
About this tool
With this Minecraft windmill generator you build a mill layer by layer. You choose from eleven types: Dutch smock mill with stage, ground sailer, post mill, round stone tower mill, hollow post mill, spider mill, Frisian tjasker, Spanish La Mancha mill, Greek island mill, watermill and modern wind turbine. Examples include De Gooyer, Kinderdijk, a Brabant post mill and a wind farm.
You set the height of the body and the width at the bottom and top, so the body tapers. The body can have 4, 6, 8, 12 or 16 sides, or be round. You add a stone base, a stage with braces, a boat shaped cap, onion cap or cone, windows, a door and a tail with a winding wheel.
For the sails you choose 4 to 12 sails, the length, the sail width and the sail pattern: lattice, half set, full sail, slabs or only the frame. You can turn the sails to any position. For a watermill you choose an undershot or overshot wheel, and for a wind farm the number of turbines and the spacing.
The front and side views, the layer plan, the 3D preview and the materials counter help you build it. Download the design as a .schem file for WorldEdit or Litematica.
Great for a Dutch polder landscape in Minecraft or a mill next to your fields. Also see the farms.
Frequently asked questions
How do I build a windmill in Minecraft?
First put a pole where the axle goes, up to the height of the sails. Then build from bottom to top: the base, the body, the stage and the cap. The sails and the tail come last.
Can the sails really turn?
In normal Minecraft, built sails do not turn. You can choose an angle with the sail position setting. If you build several mills, give each one a different position, so it looks as if they are turning.
What is the easiest way to build the sails?
Build the sails flat on the ground and then move them into place with WorldEdit or from a scaffold. That is much easier than building high in the air.
Which blocks suit a Dutch windmill?
You make a thatched body with dark wood or hay bales. A stone tower mill looks good with bricks and a dark cap. Fences make the lattice of the sails.
Can I build a wind farm?
Yes. Choose Modern wind turbine and set the number of turbines, a row or grid layout, and the spacing in rotor diameters. In real wind farms that is 5 to 7 times the diameter.
Does this work in Bedrock?
The layer plan works in every version. The .schem file is for Java Edition with WorldEdit or Litematica.