• Bell muffles for Remembrance Sunday, funerals etc
    The muffles I grew up with had a buckled strap around the flight and leather thong around the shaft. Buckling the strap held the muffle in place while you tied the thong but unless you were really lucky with the holes the strap wasn't really tight. You could then focus on making sure the thong was really tight.
    At one point we had muffles with two straps that were really difficult - they weren't long enough to wrap round like the pictures above.
    The muffles we have now have thongs top and bottom. They are a bit more fiddly to put on because the muffle isn't held in place while you tie the bottom thong. OTOH you can potentially get both ends tight.
    I do a half hitch on the first turn (strictly two half turns) and pull that really tight. Then I do however many turns are needed to leave the right lengths for the knot. Make another half turn and pull that really tight. Then hen add the slippery half turn (the bow) to lock it, and pull that really tight. NB by pull really tight I mean a couple of sharp tugs, not just a steady pull.
  • Plain Bob Triples
    As late as the 1980s the Diary was using the convention for W & M that didn't fit the coursing order convention. I discovered that while rehearsing in my head a quarter that I was going to call, on my way to the church. At the end I hadn't got to 53246. I assumed I had made a slip and went through it all again but got the same result. When I got to the tower I wrote it out on paper to check. Fortunately something (can't remember what) gave me the idea of swapping over W & M and then the composition worked.
    If I hadn't rehearsed calling it I would only have found the problem when it failed to come round at the end, which would have been embarrassing!
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