Meeting Report: 17 June 2024 – Anton Hasell on Bell Design - Audio Engineering Society

On Monday 17^th June, members and friends of the Melbourne Section of the AES gathered at the Wellington St campus of Collarts to hear bell designer Dr Anton Hasell present on the topic of:

The specialist bell design process

The event was also live-streamed on our YouTube channel for those unable to attend.

Photo of Chair Graeme Huon introducing Dr Anton Hasell — *Chair Graeme Huon introduces Dr Anton Hasell (Photo – Rod Staples)*

Section Chairman Graeme Huon introduced Anton, outlining his history and background in sculpting bells for a range of public installations.

Anton started with a description of his development of the single-pitch “harmonic” bell, a feat that had never been achieved before.

He described the way that his bell design uses Finite Element Analysis software to model the bell shape and design the mould for casting the bell.

Anton said that traditional European church bells have two notes, and the quest for monotonal (pure harmonic) bells could not be realised until Anton applied Finite Element Analysis to the problem, creating the world’s first harmonic bells.

Anton described the design process, involving multiple iterations of analysis to approach a solution.

He went on to describe the design of the Federation Bells Carillion including a unique 3-tone bell. This installation was mounted in 2001 for the Centenary of Federation.

He also described the design and casting of a Japanese temple bell for Castlemaine in 2006.

Anton then moved on to describe designing and manufacture of ten bells to be installed in the Long Now Foundation’s 10,000 Year Clock mechanism inside a mountain in Texas USA. He described the process of inventing a “difference tone” bell to extend the lower frequency limit of a smaller bell used to accommodate the limitations of the space available, involving computer design, casting and multiple iterations of physical fine-tuning.

Photo of cast bell for 10,000 year clock project — *Anton holding the cast bell for 10,000 year clock project (Photo- Rod Staples)*

Anton then described the research directions he is taking with his company, Australian Bell, namely researching musical possibilities of ancient Chinese bell design, new shapes and sounds for “twisted” sound vessels, 3D printing bells in metal, and mechanical clocks, and bells as sculpture.

He then described his research into the 3D printing of a difference-tone bell in titanium, in collaboration with the CSIRO.

Photo of Anton holding a CSIRO 3D printed titanium bell — *Anton holding a CSIRO 3D printed titanium bell (Photo – Rod Staples)*

Anton went on to outline his expansion to the design and manufacture of clock mechanisms, describing the water clock designed for the Romsey Ecotherapy Park

He expounded on his vision of public art as something that brings the community together in shared play.

A Q&A -session followed his presentation covering topics such as the casting process using 3D-printed moulds, the making of the twisted bells, the bell tuning process, the effect of different materials on the sound, newer alloys like silicon bronze, the striker materials’ effect on the bell sound, the crack in the Liberty Bell (and in other bells like Big Ben), the brittleness of traditional bell-metal, and temperature change and prolonged use effects on bell tuning.

Photo of Anton demonstrating the effect of different striker materials — *Anton demonstrating the effect of different striker materials (Photo – Rod Staples)*

The AES Melbourne Section thanks Anton for a most interesting and informative presentation, giving us an insight into a unique and little-known area of artistic expression and music generation.

We also thank Jason Torrens and Will Petts from the Collarts Wellington Street Campus for providing both the venue and the technical facilities for recording and streaming the event.

Author: Peter Smerdon (Secretary)

Here’s an edited video of the YouTube stream: