Tower Bell Ropes and Mini-Ring Ropes.
Maypole Bells manufacture Bell Ropes for towers and mini-rings, with sallies in colours of your choice. We produce all the ropes for our own products, and can manufacture tower rope bottom ends with full size sallies.
All ropes are hand made on our own rope walk and the sally is combed and trimmed using traditional handheld tools. (Some variation in the finish may occur during the handmade process).
Technical data
| Mini-ring Rope | Bell Tower Bottom End Rope | |
|---|---|---|
| Material | Matt Buff Polyester (this makes an exceptionally durable rope that is nice to handle and with a pleasing soft buff appearance | Natural Flax |
| Sally | 300mm (1′) | 920mm (3′) |
| Tail end (before tuck) | 1100mm (3′7″) | 6000mm (20′) |
| Top end | 4000mm (13′) | 900mm (2′11″) |
| Overall (before tuck) | 5400mm (17′7″) | 7820mm (26′) |
Measurements quoted are approximate, these are soft, hand-made items and may vary slightly
Many tower masters are more than capable of splicing the new bottom end to an existing top end, or we can splice the new natural Flax bottom end to any length of pre-stretched synthetic rope before it leaves the factory.
Yarn
Natural flax offers great strength, fineness & durability, making it ideal for bell ropes. However, natural fibres are susceptible to moisture variations, the rope can alter in length or become tighter when damp. We source our flax from growers in Eastern Europe.
Sally
We only use Merino blend natural wools. We offer the full range of nearly 50 colours from King Cole. As an Authorised Retailer of King Cole products, you may want purchase extra wool to to knit suitable attire or accessories to match your new sallies. A new online shop is planned, but in the meantime, pick up the phone and talk or email us.
Merino wool is fed into each of the 3 strands as part of the rope making, this creates a permanent tight grip on the wools. Each of the 3 strands has a single colour, these can be all of one colour or any combination. Merino wool is very soft and gives a comfortable hold.
Colours
Our standard Maypole Bells colours are Red (Scarlet)/ Green (Bottle Green)/ Blue (Royal Blue). We like to be innovative with sally designs and welcome your personal choice. Use our interactive colour picker below to see the full range of colours, and how your selection of colour might look. Some of the latest colours in the range have a coloured fleckle, which does not show well in these images.
You may wish to research colours associated with the Patron Saint of your church. We will do this research on your behalf as a free service. For example.
- St Nicholas:
- Red (Scarlet) - his favourite colour
- Blue (Petrol) - St Nicholas is the patron Saint to mariners
- Gold (Gold) - he is well known for giving away his inheritance, gold coins were placed into socks and would be given to used, as dowries
- St Dunstan:
- Black, Gold and Silver (silver sourced from another supplier specifically for this tower) - These represent his skills as a metalsmith.
Try out interactive sally colour picker
Colour sample images courtesy of the King Cole wools
The sally shown is just an illustration of how colours work together. Best results are seen on a full size laptop/computer screen.