MAKING A BELL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4860, 3 August 1925, Page 3

MAKING A BELL.

METHOD LITTLE CHANGED. THE PROCEDURE EXPLAINED. The method of making a modern bell, such as the 10-ton giant which is to be installed in the new tower of Bristol University, has varied very little, except for the improvements due to machinery and to new methods of turning, since the time the monks made their own, writes H.R. in the “Daily Express." First, the bell is designed on paper; then a core of brickwork is made the required size, and covered with loam and sand. This is formed into the shape corresponding to the inside of the proposed bell by-means of an instrument which is worked round and round like the arm of a compass until the right curves are moulded. For the outside shape .a cast-iron case is.used and lined with baked sand and loam made bell-shape in a similar manner. On this baked lining are chisseled the inscriptions which will afterwards appear on the bell. The case is then placed over the core, leaving a space between the two which is the exac: thickness of the new bell, and the whole is securely bolted to a cast-iron plate at the bottom. It is then baked for two or three days in order to get rid of all moisture, since the slightest trace of dampness would cause sparks of the hot metal to fly aboift during the filling process. Meanwhile the furnace men have been getting ready, and for several days have been anxiously watching a low furnace containing several tons of bell metal—an alloy of copper and tin. When the metal has reached the right temperature the furnace is tapped and the molten liquid is poureu into a giant ladle and brought .alongside each of the six moulds, which have been placed in readiness down the middle of the “shop.” Then, taking care that the flow its continual, for the presence of one bubble of air would mean a faulty bell, the fiery metal is poured into the space left between the case and the core of each mould. After some days, according to the size of the bell, .the metal cools. The case is then lifted, revealing the outside of the bell, which is turned over and the blackened core chiselled out. It is then a dull colour, and the final process is to polish it by means of sand blasting, and to tune it with a special machine, which shaveis off portions of the inside until the right note is obtained. It is then ready for mounting, either on a steel frame lor a peal of bells or on the steel girder of a carillon.