[Bell Historians] Re: Warners bells

[Richard Offen]

--- In bellhistorians at yahoogroups.com, "David Bryant" <david at b...> 
wrote:
> > My comments on the sound? The Victorian tenor sticks out like the
> > proverbial sore-thumb, and spoils a sweet-sounding six. Did 
Warners
> > attempt to re-tune it to match the others? If so, then it was a
> > failure.
> 
> I imagine the tenor will quite probably be so bad that even with the
> expertise which both of the current bellfoundries now have it would 
be
> difficult to do much with it - C&G Mears were probably the worst of 
the
> mainstram Victorian founders. Not only are their bells generally 
poor toned,
> but some are highly porous. Warner's understanding of tuning was 
linited
> compared to what can be achieved today in any case - they may well 
have just
> matched the nominals.
> 
> David

Don't do C & G Mears down so much David. Admittedly most of their 
bells were pretty dreadful, but some of them have tuned up superbly 
well - Pluckley, in Kent, (1853) are a wonderfully rich toned six, 
which WBF tuned in 1964.

R