[Bell Historians] Stayless trebles

[Richard Offen]

--- In bellhistorians at yahoogroups.com, "David Cawley" <dcawley at w...> 
wrote:
> Of course, Taylor's overcame the problem with sprung steel stays on 
some of their extremely light rings - Saxthorpe, Norfolk, being an 
example. 
> 
> Re Seasalter - or as it is now known, St Alphege, Whitstable, the 
fitting of 1" section deal stays was somewhat before Richard's time, 
although he was most helpful in assisting when the bells were put in. 
There were then only six bells and it was the front four which were 
troublesome; the two largest had larger section stays. The first four 
went within weeks, and I realised that we might be out of pocket. A 
visit to the local timber merchant produced the suggestion that deal 
was the thing, largely because it was cheap and it (usually) snapped 
off straight across the stay socket (yes, on Whitechapel 
headstocks). Hence my purchase of the material in quantity.
> It is no disgrace to say that our local band at the time had its 
fair share of breakages. The heady days of eight-bell ringing were 
still far off - we'd never even thought of it. I bought the trebles 
in 8 in 1973 by which time local stay-breaking was confined to the 
occasional learner...., and as Richard says, more frequently to the 
visitor. Am I right in thinking that ringers these days have less 
trouble with light rings than formerly ?
> 
> DL:C

I was in now way implying that I thought of the idea of deal stays at 
Whitstable/Seasalter (I still think of it as St Alphege New Church, 
Seasalter!), merely reporting that this is what we used to do.

It does seem that light bells hold less fear for a good number of 
ringers these days, than they did. however, I did hear a couple of 
ringers complaining the other day that they found a certain 7 cwt six 
far too light for their liking! Some people are never happy!

R