Ringing Forums

Surely the legacy of our Victorian structure is that what was entirely fragmented began to be pulled together in regional and national organisations. — Alan C

There's an assumption there that there were insurmountable problems with the previous state of affairs and that the Victorian structures are an improvement - the fossilised state of many ringing associations suggests not. The current organisation of ringing is closely aligned with CofE diocesan boundaries, because the impetus behind the formation of ringing societies was Belfry Reform and the CofE wanting to impose their control. In my area, prior to Belfry Reform there was a lot of movement of ringers over an area that's now covered by 4 different associations, because that made both geographic and social sense. That's mostly stopped, and ringing in the area has suffered greatly because of it.

I'm not going to make a 3 hour round trip every week to Derby to ring, but I do ring in three other associations, because they are the towers that are closest to me. In fact I don't ring in any other tower in my "home" association. I'm a notable exception in terms of cross-association ringing, very few ringers do, even experienced ones.

There are a myriad of issues with the current structures, to the point where the cluster of towers to the north of me have formed a breakaway group (although they wouldn't call it that) that's independent of both the territorial association and the CCCBR. It's based on geography and social links and is vibrant as a result.

For the context of readers not from Yorkshire, two of our branches are defunct, and a third bears a close resemblance to defunctness. — Tristan Lockheart

The Halifax Archdeaconry group that I mentioned earlier seem to be doing fairly well, although they are in Yorkshire rather than being part of the YACR. Most of their communication and organisation seems to be at the grass roots level and pretty dynamic.

The CC doesn't help itself though. Some of the stuff we get sent to pass onto our members is decidedly dull, and needs to be translated into a more engaging format. — Tristan Lockheart

True, but if you steer clear of the organisation stuff, minutes etc I think it has got a lot better, take this for example.

No doubt these issues are not confined to Yorkshire. — Jane Lynch

Due to geography I ring in four different associations, one of them Yorkshire. They all seem pretty much the same, Yorkshire seems like one of the better ones. I think member apathy is more of an indicator than root cause. As I understand it, the current diocese-based structure is mostly a legacy Oxford Movement Belfry Reform, as a means of the CofE gaining control of ringing. It often doesn't reflect what happens at grass roots any more. I don't think it's really worth rescuing, better to let it quietly fade away and replace it with something better. That's already happening in some places (from the YACR website):

Also in the south, the Halifax Archdeaconry Guild holds meetings and act as a cluster alongside the Branch, and members tend to belong to both organisations.

They are a geographical grouping where there's a lot of interaction between towers. One of the things that's struck me most is that it's normal for beginners to be "out and about" ringing at more than one tower. There's now often not enough critical mass in individual towers to allow people to progress much beyond PH&PB, so smaller clusters of towers where it's normal to ring regularly at more than one seems like a better model for addressing problems like that.

As for the role of the CCCBR, I think they already provide useful resources and there's scope for more, e.g. the discussion about membership management systems. But a lot of the CCCBR's contact with ringers is indirect, via the mostly moribund diocesan structure. Breaking those barriers down so the CCCBR is seen more as a "provider of useful stuff" by rank and file ringers rather than "something only our reps care about" seems like a good approach to me.

sure, nothing in life is free :wink:

Nothing you choose is going to be effort-free, any security updates would likely make up just a small part of that.

It doesn't sound like MemberMojo is a particularly good fit and customising it will likely be both expensive and time consuming, if indeed MemberMojo are prepared to take on the job the first place. Worst case, it may not be feasible to make your required changes at all. It would be better to choose a package that does most of what you want out of the box and adapt your processes to it rather than the other way around. Ask Birmingham City Council :rofl:

You could always run a pilot with a couple candidate packages first, with mock data.

I've done it when there was no other option, to reattach pieces of shrouding that were inaccessible when the bell was down. I looped climbing slings through the spokes of the wheel and then used rope to tie the slings off to the frame. I did this on both sides starting with the side that resulted in the stay being held against the slider, then the opposite side. So even if the stay went the wheel wouldn't move. I also did all the work from the side of the wheel, keeping out of the the bell pit.

Because I was drilling the wheel there was a risk of accidentally pushing it off the stay, so tying it was definitely the lower risk option.

I'm sure you are right :roll: and if that's the case it's unlikely a commercial membership service will be around that long.

I don't disagree with your comments about the current territorial setup being outdated (I ring in 3 different associations most weeks), but I think you'd probably want 2-3 willing guinea pig assocs if there was to be any chance of success developing something.

1. To be eligible for election to the status of Qualified Member a ringer shall have rung to a method either
a) on tower bells 720 changes on either a working bell or the treble; or the tenor covering to 1260 changes; or
b) 720 changes on a pair of handbells.
2. Associate Members are those ringers who have not yet qualified for (1) above.

The choice of name seems a bit odd though, as not all of us are Residents of Gods Own County.

the one I linked to (Tendenci) has ridiculous hosting charges ($250 pcm) but it's Open Source so you could host it yourself. A more realistic price for hosting for it would be in the $25 - $50 range,

I've looked at membermojo's docs and it doesn't seem to support anything that looks like it could be used for multi-level membership, although some other similar systems do.

But I think the main problems with your suggestion wouldn't be technical ones...

where are the bells in relation to the opening panels? Our tenor used to "shout" terribly at one stroke, as it struck directly facing a louvre. We have two sets of louvres, both pretty large, so we've completely blocked up the lower ones which are in line with the bells and that's made a huge difference.

Perhaps try closing just the panel that's nearest the tenor to see if that helps and if it does, consider modifying it so the opening section is above the bells if possible?

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.