Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 July 1875 — An Enormous Bell. [ARTICLE]

An Enormous Bell.

The famous Emperor bell, the casting of which has been completed, ranks fifth in size among the great bells of the world. The largest are the two Moscow bells, weighing respectively 193 tons and sixtythree tons; but neither of them are now in use, as the first was broken in 1737 and the latter fell in 1855. The great bell of Pekin is said to weigh fifty-three tons, and the Novogorod bell thirty-one tons. The Emperor bell weighs over twenty-five tons. In describing this tintinnabulic monster a writer in the London Builder says: This famous new bell, which is to be hung in the southern tower of Cologne Cathedral, now rapidly reaching completion, after the impulse given at the close of the Franco-German war, is cast from French guns captured during that campaign, presented by the German Emperor to the committee charged with the work of completing that cathedral. The bell has been cast at the machine works (to which is attached a bell-foundry) of Harr Andrew Hamm, at Frankenthal, an industrial town of the Palatinate; and it was only after two failures andmfter untold anxiety and care that he was able to produce the work which will hand down his name to posterity. It should be men-* tioned here that the first casting took place on Aug. 19, 1873; the second on Nov. 13 of the same year; the third and successful cast was made on Oct. 3,1874. Before describing his handiwork let us have a look at its cradle. On entering the machine works we notice on the nght the casting-pit, neatly ten feet deep, twenty feet long, and sixteen and a half feet broad, with the temporary belfry, and a strong framework, to which the gin for raising the bell from the pit is secured. On tire left is the furnace, separated from the casting-house by a wall. In the latter is an opening, permitting the running in of the molten bell-metal into the mold. The

usual mode of casting bellshad to be somewhat departed from, probably on account of the huge size of the new bell; and we subjoin the following account of the difficult process: In the pit a hollow core of brickwork was first erected. This received a coating of loam, and the whole was then smoothed by means of careful. gauging until the exterior of the core presented the same dimensions and form as the intended bell. ■ On this core the so-called “ false bell’Ver “ model bell” was formed, also of loam. It had to be the exact counterpart of the real one; it received the same decorations and the same inscriptions, made partly of tallow and partly of wax. Another thin coating was then applied to serve as a separator between the false bell and the “shell” of the bell. She latter rested on an iron ring, provided with eyes, and was bound round besides with strong iron hoops, to make it more secure. In the hollow core a fire was now lighted through an opening left at the top, andcore, false bell and shell were thoroughly dried and burnt hard; while at the same time the decorations and inscriptions of, the false bell, formed of wax and tallow, melted. The shelf was then lifted by means of chains, the false bell broken up and the shell lowered again in its place and the whole covered up. A. tackle, ot eight sets of pulleys, which, in its turn, had to be raised by another set of tackle, was put up for lifting the new bell at the proper time out of the pit. The iron beam to which it was suspended had a diameter of eight inches. The furnace, with two grates at its working side, each" of an area of about thirty-three square feet, consumed at each cast twenty tons of coal. The metal was put in through an opening at the back of the furnace on to the hearth, of an area of over thirty-six square feet. At the first cast each of the twenty cannon used for the bell was pushed in resting on a truck. They weighed together about 50,000 pounds (German); |o this was added 8,000 weight of tin. At the first cast the metal took from one o’clock at night until three o’clock the next afternoon before it was perfectly liquid, fit for running off. At the two following castings the time of melting was only ten hours, from five a. m. to three p. m. At the last cast the filling of the mold took twenty-nine minutes and a half without any mishap. But then followed four long, weary weeks of anxious waiting before the shell could be ‘broken, but when it fell the master had the satisfaction of seeing that his labor had at last been crowned with perfect success.

A feeling of silent admiration steals over the beholder as he looks upon this mighty form, ten feet eight inches high, of a diameter of eleven feet twq inches, which weighs 52,500 German pounds (over i twenty-five tons), and which will receive a clapper or hammer of nine feet ten inches long, weighing 1,530 pounds. The bell, which has at the souna-bow a thickness of thirteen and one-half inches, taper towards the crown to a little over three inches. The screw passing through the crown of the bell, and through the apparatus for receiving the hammer, is of corresponding size, weighing 996 pounds, and carries a nut weighing 178 pounds. The six arms forming the crown are decorated w ith angel’s heads, and end where they join the bell jn lion’s feet. The Emperor bell, which was shipped at Frankenthal on the 15th of April, arrived safely at Cologne on the Bth of May. The somewhat lengthened voyage, which was interrupted at the principal towns along the Rhine to give the inhabitants an opportunity of viewing the monster, was successfully performed. The transport from the wharf to the southern tower was accomplished without accident on the 13th of May, under the special supervision of Herr Hamm, amongst the excitement of thousands of spectators. A wagon had to be expressly made for moving it from the foundry on board a sailing-barge on the canal leading to the Rhine, and this was used again on its arrival at Cologne, for its transit from the river to the cathedral. An idea may be formed of the difficulties attending it when it is stated that it took eleven hours to move the mass a distance of 350 paces on a level roadway.