In change ringing, each bell has a wheel with a rope and swings full circle, from the 'mouth up' position all the way around to the 'mouth up' position again.
The bells are held in place in their upright position by a piece of wood (the stay), which is designed to break under excess force to avoid damaging the bell.
The bells in the tower are extremely heavy. This, accompanied by gravity, creates a huge momentum, while the bell swings round over 360 degrees. As a result, the bells take approximately 2 seconds to rotate. This means that traditional 'tunes' cannot be rung. Instead, ringers make each bell strike (ring) once, one after the other (known as a change), before each striking again, often in a different order.
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