Ringing Forums

From what I've seen something that is sometimes done is to re-profile the clapper, which means reducing the diameter of the shaft on a lathe. But from the description of yours, it sounds like that may not be an option, as it's been welded. I think you probably need to take professional advice.

We regularly use Musical Bell Combinations because we rarely have 8 ringers, we have the PDF version laminated and on the tower wall. The combinations for 5 bells are particularly useful, because an adjacent 5 out of 8 can sound rather strange. It also means that we can have light bells for those who need them, whilst still ringing the back bells (tenor is 17cwt).

One reason back bells are often not rung is because of the mystique and bullshit that surrounds them, with only the Ringing Gods being permitted to ring The Mighty Tenor. If people don't get a chance to ring heavy bells and thereby learn the necessary technique then surprise, surprise, they will shy away from them and they won't get rung.

I completely agree with all of that, if there was a "like" button, I'd have clicked it :wink:

The age range at our tower is 11 to 80, I used to participate in a different sort of group activity where the age range was also that wide. One of the big benefits was it gave young people the chance to form relationships with adults on their own terms and as peers, away from the usual parent or teacher ones. Over time you could see the youngster's interpersonal skills and confidence grow, and the wrinklies loved it as well. It was common to see a group with an age span of many decades "hanging out" together, eating lunch and generally shooting the breeze. There aren't many activities that can do that, I think ringing is one of them and we should recognise and promote that.

I do hope this comparison isn't suggesting that 62 is old! — Nigel Goodship

I hope not, otherwise I am :lol:

But it seems to be commonly regarded as "too old" in the ringing world...

ours was the same, the crown staple flapped around and couldn't be sufficiently tightened. During the 2018 rehang the headstocks were removed to be refurbished, so we took the opportunity to have twiddle pins fitted, so we could deal with any odd-struckness.

The shaft of ours is engineering plastic rather than wood, not exactly sure what. It's less than a year old so no idea about longevity, but we kept the old one under the bell so we have it it needs be. And AFAIK removing a clapper from the tower needs faculty approval.

We've just had one fitted on our tenor, which nobody could get up right (thanks G&J). It does seem to have fixed the problem - the crown staple was also dimensioned wrongly on the old one, so the whole lot was replaced. I haven't done the first maintenance on it yet, but as I had to crawl under the bell to grease the clapper bearing, having to crawl under it to check some bolts instead is no big deal. The clapper bearing is now a maintenance-free ball bearing rather than a plain bearing, so maintaining the tenor doesn't mean fighting with a grease gun.

I think determining what the root problem is first is best - it's not just the clapper that's important, it's the whole assembly, bell versus clapper swing times etc. I'm sure any competent bellhanger will assess all that anyway.

All I said was that it takes longer, which it does. — Simon Linford

Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't, I don't think sweeping generalisations help. I also think that progress isn't linear - some people can pick up the bell control stage very quickly and then top out soon after, others take longer to at the start but then pick up the pace later on.

We have an 11 year old who controls the bell beautifully, he's just starting to ring rounds. He started last May and if he sticks at it I'm sure will be an excellent ringer. We have a 62 year old who started in November and has almost caught up with him. Who knows how far each of them will go, I certainly don't. And why does it matter anyway, they are both assets to ringing and both deserve the opportunities they need to reach their full potential.

Will they get to Cambridge? I don't know - some of them would certainly hope so. On the other hand, the young Brumdingers rang a course of cambridge minor last week with two 10 year olds in the band. — Simon Linford

As a Minor-only ringer, after being berated for not being "Up to ringing on 8", 3 weeks later I rang Cambridge Major at a branch practice, because I had the prerequisites (and mysteriously, the sudden motivation) to do so. So what? The plural of "anecdote" is not "proof", either way.

you make some good points.

any strategy for supporting ongoing development should apply to all recent learners, gaining experience, wanting to ring more complex methods or to strike better (or to ring at more towers, etc) as age is not a defining factor then.

Agreed it should be a level playing field. And whilst in some places I'm sure it is, the truth is that the expectations of older learners are always lower, and that is inevitably reflected in the opportunities that are made available to them.

a little like the women in ringing focus you may need to be firmer that you do want to progress to avoid being pigeonholed as a happy, community minded ringer who will cover very well for the rest of their ringing career. — Lucy Chandhial

It's now widely and rightly considered that the issues that women face need to be addressed, and indeed that's happening. I've seen no recognition that ageism is also an issue.

The general concept of being open minded about why people want to ring and how people want to develop (or not) could well be a Ringing 2030 theme as ringers can be put off by any external expectations, pushing them forward or holding them back, when it’s based on assumptions rather than individual wants and needs. — Lucy Chandhial

I completely agree, but I see no sign of it. I think the concentration on recruitment as the top priority is a mistake, there's no point recruiting people if the infrastructure needed for them to reach their full potential isn't there, which in most places it isn't. Relatively speaking, it's easy to recruit, retaining and maximising the potential of recruits is much harder.

We met an adult ringer from a tower about 30 mins away from us at a branch meeting yesterday. He's been ringing for longer than I have and for the last 5 years, he's been trying to master PB6. Not only that, but he believes that once he has, he'll have cracked method ringing.

Firstly, nobody should be left struggling for that long, it's a good illustration of just how poor method teaching is in some places.

Secondly, there's no way a youngster would still be around, they'd have given up ages ago whereas adults are much more likely to stick at it. That reinforces the orthodoxy that youngsters are always "better" than adults. Some are, some aren't, it's not as clear cut as is generally claimed.

link is in the post above. Plenty about young recruits, which is great. But I've not found anything that specifically addresses the needs of older ringers, i.e. the majority of current recruits - it's almost as if they don't exist.

From the outside, the 2030 programme seems to be an attempt to roll things back to the way they were when the current "ringing hierarchy" were learning themselves, as youngsters. Those days are gone and are unlikely to return. Not only are the numbers used to justify the programme dubious, they fly in the face of demographics - we are a rapidly ageing population. Youth recruitment is important, but it is not the sole solution to towers going quiet. The CCCBR needs to cater for the requirements of the majority of people who are taking up ringing, and provide the support they need to progress as far as they can in the (as we are constantly reminded) limited time they have.

, @Penelope Bellis's experience mirrors mine - it's not that there aren't people who are supportive and encouraging of adult learner's, but there's enough of the opposite to make the the process far less pleasant that it should be.

Ringing also has an ageism issue, indeed it's now official CCCBR policy that adult learners aren't who ringing wants, despite the fact that they make up the majority of people interested in taking it up.

Seems like there's general consensus that 1.5x - 2x the number of bells is ideal, I think we'll settle towards the lower end as people's attendance is good. There also seems to be agreement that a steady flow of learners is better than "boom or bust", to get people ringing quickly and integrated into the band. And asking people to wait if necessary - which we've done.

Potato, Potato.

Perhaps you should agree to split the difference? :rofl:

https://www.engineering.com/story/pins-roll-pins-cotter-pins-and-keys-selecting-the-right-pin-for-mechanical-assembly

teaching entire bands from scratch tends to be older learners, who tend to take more effort to get into method ringing — Simon Linford

I think there's probably as much variation with in age groups than there is between them - . Perhaps what's more important than age is attitude and approach? A lot of older learners may be taking up ringing because they perceive it as a nice gentle, traditional hobby to take up in retirement, and to socialise with like-minded people. Nothing wrong with that, and indeed that's what many towers provide. But if you want to be a method ringer, you have to be determined and focussed - perhaps even bordering on the obsessive, irrespective of age.

Maybe rather than bucketing people by age, we need to be more nuanced and provide enhanced support for those who have the potential and willingness to become method ringers? Although quite how you'd do that is a good question. Another issue is that as far as I know there's no ringing community wide way of "fast tracking" such people, it tends to be down to geographical luck and word of mouth. Potential method ringers (of all ages) are almost certainly falling through the cracks at the moment. Do we need an "ART++"?

Would you say it's almost impossible to teach a new band from scratch and expect them to be a method ringing band without considerable ongoing support? — Simon Linford

There are bands who are well-established but who have "topped out" at CCs & PH, do you think the same applies there as well? There are differences from your scenario as there's already someone in charge, and the band is stable. Perhaps they might be a better bet for "Sending the elevator back down", provided of course that there's a strong desire in the band to move things on in the first place.

That's more or less the situation of my home tower and we are working towards being a method band, except we are doing it without external help. Three of us can ring simple methods and the rest of the band are "up for it". Expectations of method ringing are being set from the start with any beginners. It's early days and wouldn't describe us as a "method band" yet, but we are making progress. I'm interested in any thoughts about on what sorts of pitfalls we might meet, and things that might help us :smile:

a bell project led by an enthusiastic person or small team, will be able to raise a lot of money for a bell project — Alison Hodge

Been there, done that, I have no interest in being responsible for another tower which I wouldn't ring at anyway. I'm not even CofE so I think I've more than done my bit already, fundraising and project managing the rehang at the tower that's still going. If the PCCs of the other towers want to take on getting the bells going I'm happy to advise and help, but that's it.

"Get out and about to get on" is just as true here, but there are fewer opportunities and there's more travelling involved. That's never going to be a realistic option for everyone anyway, for a number of reasons, I'm the only "itinerant" at our tower. But there are other measures of progress besides "Can they ring Surprise Major?", we've gone from nobody being in the local Association to all of us, we've started going to branch practices and arranging our own tower outings and so on. Enthusiasm and progress (in relative terms!) are at an all-time high.

None of our recent recruits have come from the congregation, indeed most aren't churchgoers. But we live in a fairly small community and most people know who we are - not sure if that's good or bad :wink: If we want to get on we have to make it happen within the band as there isn't really a pool of experienced and willing ringers in the area we can call on, most of the towers around are either inactive, or in an even worse position than we are. That's been both a challenge and an opportunity, if we want to do stuff, we as a band have to work together to make it happen rather than relying on people parachuting in. But on the upside, we all "own" the process and the decisions together, and I think that may be more sustainable long term.

thanks for the info. Our band are all regular attendees so I think we could cope fewer than 2x the number of bells. We too have asked people to wait until we had the ability to teach them, the thinking is that it's better to give people a good experience and get them ringing as quickly as possible with the band, rather than having more beginners making slower progress.

It's been great seeing a long-standing CC band start learning methods, the turning point was when we got through a Minimus method in one practice. The boost that gave to people's confidence was huge - it was never the case that they didn't want to ring methods, they just didn't think they could. People are doing homework, the vocabulary is changing from bell numbers to places etc - it's all good. I think if you don't have an established method band to slot people into, small steps (in the same way we teach handling) are the key.

It is good question though, how do you restart ringing at silent towers, when there's no ready-made band? I suspect that's going to become an increasingly common scenario over the next few years. I know it has been done successfully in some places but it must have been a slow, hard process - and I wonder how far they got? My suspicion is perhaps as far as CCs and PH, but without existing method ringers providing support, method ringing seems like an almost insurmountable challenge. My tower has 3 of us who can ring methods, and even then it's a challenge, albeit one that we are meeting.

As I said, we don't have enough ringers, which is why we are training some. The question is how many are "enough"?

I ran the HLF bid and project management for the rehang of the active one in 2018 and I'm still working on it. I'm in no hurry to repeat the experience, although I'd be happy to help if there was someone who wanted to take on the others (there isn't).

But it's unlikely either of them will ever ring again. At one, the frame is derelict and needs a full rehang, the church had a large bequest recently but there was no interest in doing anything with the bells. The other is a 14cwt 8 shoved in a ridiculously small tower with access via a trapdoor. One person has to ring in a niche in the wall, another has to stand on the closed trap, they are all drawn and tricky to handle. The frame is on 2 tiers, you have to stand on the headstocks of the lower one to work on the top and there's a huge derelict clock directly below. Everything that moves needs attention. The congregation are on the evangelical side with little interest in the bells, there's been a PCC civil war of the sort that the CofE is so good at that resulted in the vicar leaving, and when it was ringing there were noise complaints which resulted in it being rung just once a fortnight at a weird time in the middle of Sunday afternoon.

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