Anyone Have a Bell? How/Where Did You Mount it?

[Mark1977]

Rules shmules...... bells now adays are purely decorative.

[markpierce]

Originally Posted by Bill Burgette

But you're supposed to have it on a 40 footer....right?

Maybe, but measure precisely because 12 meters equals 39.37 feet or 39 feet and 4.44 inches. The measurement is the distance between the hull ends.

Get clarification from Captain Bill. He says a rule change affected boats between 12 and 20 meters but not in inland waters, if I correctly understand.

[Lancerbye]

As well as the decommissioned bell I have a loud hailer with auto fog horn signals. I prefer that in a fog.

[ty.gregory]

If I had a bell like that I'd find a place for it. Alas, I have no bell, and even if I did, I have no boat.

[markpierce]

I agree. Automatic controls (see control at lower center of upper panel) for the horn are the way to go.

[Lancerbye]

Originally Posted by ty.gregory

If I had a bell like that I'd find a place for it. Alas, I have no bell, and even if I did, I have no boat.

Well you know what you have to do. You have to buy a boat so you have a place to install a bell. Sounds logical to me.

[capnorv]

Beautiful bell! True a bell is not required for your vessel, but I have a 6" bell mounted on the boom gallows on our 34' and have found it extremely useful for signaling in anchorages for dinner, getting underway, etc. Our 45' has now got a 8" bell mounted on the mizzen mast right behind the helm station, with a set of ear plugs to enable it's proper use LOL. I used to have a 27' that I mounted a 6" bell on the starboard side rear of the house on a piece of teak, later moved it to a cold molded hard dodger I made. Sorry, no pics of that, but the others can probably be zoomed in on on my users page album. And yes, it's still required 8", 12 meter, inland only, at anchor, 5 rapid gongs/2 minutes, but rarely used. Any action to avoid collision in limited visibility is the responsibility of the skipper, not just following the rules,I'm not a maritime lawyer, but that's my interpretation.I don't think there's to many of us with boats that would get the better of a cruise ship, freighter, or tanker, and I for one don't want to try.

[Nicholson58]

My yard mate has a bell similar to yours, sorry no photos. He has it mounted to a teak platform between the mast and cockpit with a line rigged to operate it from the cockpit. Make sure you lag it down well or it may go away. Quite a nice bell. Leave it as is or use a Scotch Brite wheel to but a brite polish on it in about 10 minutes. We bought our pretty nice 10" bell just before the rule was changed. I didn't see a nice place to mount so I rigged a SS shackle to hang it from the aft side of the dodger near the binacle. We move it on deck when we are on board and store it from overhead hand grips below.