Water and steam power were both used to perform a variety of tasks on large estates
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Ward Family, Alton
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In a hollow at the lower end of the Lime Walk is a stone building adjoining a large overtype waterwheel.
Inside is a beam engine, a type central to the development of steam power and the Industrial Revolution. This engine dates from around 1850 and has been restored in a setting similar to that in which it is thought to have worked when new.
It was used by a large firm in the North-East of England where it was employed to drive a fixed threshing machine in a barn, along with other mills and equipment by means of a line shaft and belts. There are stories that the engine took over the task of driving the threshing machine from an older waterwheel, after augmenting it initially. The engine is currently being erected and when finished will be provided with low pressure steam from the adjacent egg-ended boiler.
The waterwheel came to Hollycombe from a farm in nearby Bramshott, prior to which it worked in Cornwall.