[Bell Historians] Canon retaining headstocks

[Susan & Christopher Dalton]

I am on record as saying that I am inclined to believe there is only one 
really decent type of canon-retaining stock and that is a wooden one! True
or false?

Lots of designs have been tried by different founders/hangers over the years
and they have probably now got as good as they are going to get.

If not wooden, these stocks are either of cast iron or steel (I don't think
Warners ever used aluminium for canon-retainers). G & J's cast iron "pot"
type (or "yoke" type as I call it in B B Dorset) could crack, but then I
have also seen cracks in nearly new steel canon-retainers (no names!). This
may have been part of the reason why G & J went over to their steel "coffin"
type as formerly fitted at Salisbury St Thomas (1948). I think the
changeover date was the Second World War.

G & J's steel coffin type had a predecessor designed and used by Warners.
These seem to work well enough at Bredon where the four out of five bells
with canons were fitted with them in 1914. Warners indeed were easily the
first of the big boys to fit canon-retainers.

C D