I've had a busy week of online ringing. Last Saturday we tried a quarter of Cambridge Maximus, in Handbell Stadium, with the band that rang the peal of Cambridge Royal, plus Graham Firman. We didn't find it very easy, and eventually had to stop because someone's laptop was running out...

This morning I rang in the first internet 10-bell peal.

Guild of St Cuileáin
Handbell Stadium, UK
Saturday, 6 June 2020 in 2h 58
5040 Cambridge Surprise Royal
Composed by John H Fielden
1-2 Lesley H M Boyle (Reach)
3-4 Gareth Davies (Reach)
5-6 Graham A C John (C - Brimpton)...

The ActionXL USB motion controllers can be very light and fiddly to ring, so many ringers attach them to something handbell-shaped, or to a handbell to give it a more natural feel.

John Schreiner, being an organ-builder, has the benefit of his own workshop, and used those facilities to make...

Handbell Stadium, UK
Thursday, 21 May 2020 in 49m
1282 Cambridge Surprise Royal
1-2 Lesley H M Boyle (Reach)
3-4 Gareth Davies (Reach)
5-6 Graham A C John (C - Brimpton)
7-8 Simon Humphrey (Wetton)
9-10 Simon J Gay (Glasgow)
First of Royal on Handbell Stadium.

I'm still helping Graham John with his tests of Handbell Stadium. On Sunday we tried to ring a quarter of Cambridge Royal, but we lost it twice, first for technical reasons (one of my bells got stuck) and then with a good old-fashioned fire-up. We were having problems with network...

Last Saturday Simon and I took part in the Illinois Online Bell Bash, where we were invited by Tom Farthing to give a talk about handbell ringing and our new book.  Usually this is an event that ringers travel to and ring together, but Tom and his crew managed to...

On Thursday I helped Graham John test a new version of Handbell Stadium, again with Lesley Boyle and Gareth Davies, and Simon Humphrey too. The new version has a feature that Graham calls "ping balancing", which compensates for the differing network transmission delays to different ringers. (In the online gaming...

On Sunday evening we had another unsuccessful attempt at the quarter in Handbell Stadium. In the first attempt, one of my bells got stuck when the computer stopped recognising the motion sensor. In the second attempt, which lasted well over half way, we were hit by a big increase in...

Today should have been the Scottish Handbell Day, but like so many other things, it can't go ahead. However, yesterday I tried out Graham John's Handbell Stadium, both for solo practice and online ringing with other people.

Handbell Stadium works with little motion controllers that plug into USB ports. They...