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Tom Scott England S01E01 Episode 1 Engsub
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00:00I went on a road trip through every English county
00:03and filmed something interesting in each of them.
00:05And my journey started with fire, molten metal,
00:08and taking a sledgehammer to a piece of history,
00:10in the centre of the country, in Leicestershire.
00:15It was 7am when I parked up at the John Taylor Bell Foundry,
00:19the last working bell foundry in the UK.
00:22Hello! I'm sorry, I'm late, I managed to lose my car keys.
00:25And after a few quick hellos, I was pointed straight into one of the buildings,
00:29where they turn molten metal into bells that weigh tons.
00:33Wow! Just bells casually lying on the floor?
00:37Nope, completely wrong.
00:38Those are not bells, and I would find that out in a minute.
00:41Now, there are around 30 people working at the foundry,
00:44I met quite a few of them over the course of the day,
00:46but the folks I spent most time with were Anthony and Sam.
00:49Samuel, bonjour.
00:51Anthony's the foreman, he's been working there for a while, and Sam...
00:54You've been working here how long?
00:55I've been here six years, I started at 16,
00:58and when I first started, I couldn't lift, move, or carry this.
01:03And now...
01:04All right.
01:05Hang on.
01:08Okay, right, well, this is going to be embarrassing.
01:12Okay, I can at least lift it.
01:13You can...
01:13I can do that.
01:16No, not out of the arms length.
01:18Can't do that.
01:19He passed it to me because we were using it for a job.
01:21He just, he just...
01:24I literally just walked by him, handed it to him,
01:26and it nearly just went slightly away with it.
01:28And was like, I'm going!
01:29The plan for the day was to cast four bells, and I'm going to be there,
01:33generally demonstrating why I tend to work with a keyboard,
01:36and not massive heavy lumps of stuff that need workshop cranes to move them.
01:40If you want to get involved at any point, that will not be a problem.
01:43I'm not sure what the city boy can really add to...
01:47Can you swing a hammer?
01:49Have you ever swung a hammer?
01:50I've done like half-day of blacksmithing once.
01:53Ooh, okay.
01:54Yeah, I'll be alright.
01:54When we have to smash the bells up, because that's graft.
01:57All right.
01:58So, morons...
01:59Oh, have we got bells to smash up?
02:00Yeah, what, four.
02:01No, five.
02:02Oh, I don't want to do it.
02:04For anyone wondering on the camera, Sam is the age of a fetus.
02:07Straight out of school, straight into it, and he was lovely and he was polite,
02:11and he did as he was told, and now he's the most teenage teenager I've ever met.
02:16But I'm not a teenager anymore.
02:17Yeah, well, you want to act like it sometimes.
02:20No.
02:22He's not going to get a Kevin the Teenager reference, is he?
02:24No, he's not.
02:25Sam cranked open the drying oven,
02:27and we started by sitting next to it with a cup of tea.
02:30The oven's not hot, it's not like a domestic oven,
02:33it's just warm enough to make sure that everything that's put inside
02:36dries out.
02:37So anything bell-related has to be dried before we can even think about going
02:43near it with molten metal.
02:44These are the four bells that we're going to be casting today.
02:46Oh, right.
02:48Okay, so that...
02:49So I'm confused, because those are already cast.
02:52No, so these are the outer molds.
02:55Hang on, yeah, let me move my chair as well.
03:00So that's just the outside mold surface.
03:03This is what the finished bell will look like.
03:05So it's got all of its inscription and what the customer's asked for,
03:09all the lettering.
03:10Yeah.
03:10And then this later on will get lowered over the top of these cores.
03:14Now that's the inside shape.
03:16Right.
03:16So they'll marry up.
03:18And then the cavity in between this surface and that surface
03:23is the thickness of the bell.
03:25Right.
03:25That's got to be so precise.
03:27Well, yeah.
03:28Well, we'll find out when we close them later, but...
03:31The outer casing of those molds is metal.
03:33That's what I saw on the floor earlier.
03:35All the cases for different sizes and shapes and styles of bell.
03:38And those cases date back to the 1840s,
03:41because they're big lumps of metal to keep the more delicate molds inside safe.
03:45They don't need replacing.
03:46But packed into those cases are the actual molds for the bells.
03:50So the molding material that we use to make bells is called loom.
03:55And it's effectively like a sticky mud.
03:57That's loom.
03:58L-O-A-M.
04:00Some parts of the world pronounce it loam.
04:02But loom is basically sand, clay, bit of water,
04:06with some extra stuff we'll talk about in a moment.
04:08So this material here...
04:10Yep.
04:10...is made of this.
04:12Oh, right.
04:13We apply this to the steel case, so you can see how that's the steel case there.
04:19Oh, you're right, it is warm in here.
04:20It's lovely.
04:22And then we've got the loom here.
04:24Obviously, because this is wet, that's what we have to dry.
04:27They make the bell molds out of loom, press all the letters and designs into it,
04:31and then once it's dried, it's solid.
04:33I was worried about putting a fingerprint in the loom and distorting the bell,
04:36but no, Anthony can knock on it once it's dry.
04:39Wait, that can't be made of louvre.
04:41Yeah, it's all...
04:43That is the same material as that.
04:46Just dried out?
04:47Yes.
04:47Has it got anything added to it?
04:49It's got clay, goat's hair, and horse manure.
04:55Sure, okay.
04:56Well, the horse manure, because horses can chew straw a lot finer than we can cut it.
05:01I had to do some research to work out why they need that, and while I can't be certain,
05:06most of the sources I found say it's because when the bells cast,
05:09organic materials burn when hit by the molten metal,
05:12and that creates tiny channels for gases to escape.
05:14If you didn't have them, steam would build up and the whole thing would explode.
05:18Someone, centuries ago, figured out that's a good way to stop your bells exploding.
05:23And the reason it all has to be dried first...
05:26Any moisture in there is going to instantly expand when the molten metal hits it.
05:30Oh, and you're going to get steam and bubbles.
05:31Yeah, in a closed cavity.
05:33It's not just going to steam, it'll go bang.
05:35Right, that's right.
05:35So everything has to be dried.
05:37So today that is, as Sam has described it, perfect nap temperature.
05:41That doesn't sound safe.
05:45That's the outer casing of the bell mould,
05:47but a bell is not a solid lump of metal,
05:49so you also need the core, the inside part of the bell mould.
05:53And at this point, Sam casually broke out the blowtorch.
05:56Pre-warn it, it's about to get warm.
05:58Yeah, it is, so I'm going to move out of the way.
06:02Oh, okay, what?
06:08So, because this is a different mould material...
06:12Right, what's the material?
06:13Well, we call it air-set sand.
06:15Right.
06:16So we have to, I can explain all this in a minute.
06:20That inner core is made of chemically bonded sand.
06:23They've got a small silo of sand in the corner of the foundry,
06:26along with two big barrels of resin and catalyst,
06:29and a mixing machine with various controls over it.
06:31What comes out initially feels just like slightly sticky sand,
06:34you can sculpt with it.
06:35But over time, the resin will harden it into a solid mass,
06:39and the settings on the controls let you choose how rigid or crumbly it gets,
06:42and whether it takes minutes or hours to get there.
06:45But because the core is made of that sand, it can't go in the oven.
06:50So these all have to have an alcohol-based coating,
06:52which we then set fire to, which is what we just did, and that cures it.
06:56Cures it, right.
06:58Okay, this is the face of an idiot
07:01who is trying to understand the sequence of events here.
07:04Okay, so, outer mould of the bell, with the design pressed into it,
07:08that's made of loom inside a reusable Victorian-era steel case,
07:11which gets dried solid in the oven.
07:13Inner mould of bell, big solid lump of chemically bonded sand,
07:17covered in several coatings, and cured with fire.
07:21Different temperatures can damage moulds in different ways.
07:24Basically, because we let the moulds cool slowly, that puts added strain and pressure on the sand moulds,
07:31so they need an extra step of protection.
07:34The final layer on those inner cores is a grey coat with graphite in it,
07:38and that's to let the final bell come out of the mould easily.
07:40Normally, if you're casting metal, you want it to cool quite fast, but for bells, it's got to be slow.
07:45Otherwise, the tone of the bell won't sound right.
07:48So, to cast a bell, you kind of have to go against all of the good principles of making a
07:53good casting.
07:55Right.
07:56So it's a constant...
07:57Because otherwise it won't sound right?
07:58Yeah, basically.
07:59It will just sound a bit sharp, which is a big thing.
08:03Right.
08:03I don't bell ring or anything like that, and I'm not very musically gifted.
08:07I can play the triangle.
08:09I think sharp there is referring not to the pitch of the bell,
08:12but to the quality of the sound, whether it's resonant,
08:15and it sounds like you're ringing a bell, not just hitting a lump of metal with a hammer.
08:19That, I was expecting that to go clunk.
08:22That did not go, that actually sounds really nice.
08:24We won't know if this mould's been any good, considering we made it,
08:28you know, this is two weeks worth of work.
08:30Oh yeah, and you use it once.
08:31Yep, and it'll all boil down to 20 minutes.
08:36Once the metal's in, sort of give it 20 minutes to solidify, and then that's it.
08:41That's two weeks worth of work, and we've just got to see and hope that it was done right.
08:46What's it like the first time doing that?
08:48I imagine it's more from your memory.
08:50I get really nervous.
08:52Every time?
08:52No, he gets nervous about things.
08:54I'm the more chill one, to be fair.
08:55Yeah, he's the most Gen Z person other than that.
08:57He just does not care.
08:58I don't stress about anything.
09:00Nothing's worth stressing about.
09:02It is.
09:03It frustrates me how, like, that's to say he's not complacent or anything like that.
09:07Oh, he's just got a much better mindset about it.
09:11But I'll still get a bit twitchy and a bit nervous, like, every time.
09:17And it's not a bad thing either, you know, it's a dangerous job.
09:25You know, it's a dangerous job, he says casually putting the fire out.
09:29The techniques have changed a bit over time.
09:31Chemically bonded sand and compressed air hoses are obviously modern inventions.
09:34But if you put a 15th century bell founder in that workshop,
09:38I think they'd recognise most of the processors.
09:41And the metal would be much the same, about a 4 to 1 ratio of copper to tin.
09:46It's not quite medieval still, but it's about as medieval as a modern job gets.
09:52First of all, let's go and turn the fire alarm off.
09:55Oh, because there's going to be a fire.
09:57But why would, in a building designed to burn things, why would you put fire alarm in?
10:01Bearing in mind, if we can't put it out and we're running, just run to.
10:05If we can't put it out, run away.
10:07Cases have been dried, cores have been coated.
10:10Those will get put together in a bit, but next they need to get the furnace going.
10:14The inside here is like a ceramic pot. You can just see the lip of it here.
10:18When we get it going, the fire will create like a cyclone around that pot and heat it up.
10:23And that's how we, so when this gets red hot, that's how we'll melt the metal.
10:27If that leaks for whatever reason, the metal has to be able,
10:31its full contents has to be able to go somewhere.
10:33So under these two plates, you can just sort of see down here, is a massive trough.
10:38Yeah.
10:39That's just, we have to keep empty at all times.
10:41So that if this starts to leak, we can drain it straight into this trough.
10:45Which is going to give people a very bad day cleaning up afterwards,
10:48but it safely gets the metal out of the way.
10:50But that bad day of cleaning is infinitely better than…
10:53The molten metal spilling on the floor of this.
10:56Yeah, than the other consequences, absolutely.
10:59But then as an added safety feature,
11:03this whole floor is a giant sand pit.
11:06These are just steel plates put on the floor for us to walk on.
11:10But underneath this is just sand.
11:13It's a diesel powered furnace,
11:15a colossal thing that takes hours to heat up to the temperature it needs.
11:19Because it's not warmed up yet,
11:21you can feel a little bit of heat there.
11:23So you can feel that vortex.
11:26Oh, you pull.
11:27Yeah.
11:27Yeah, you can.
11:28A little bit of heat coming from there.
11:29A little bit of heat.
11:30And then you look under there.
11:31Oh, blimey, all right.
11:33You can see the flame inside there.
11:36Now you can see the flame starting to circle up.
11:39Oh, yeah.
11:40Right, now we're on the clock.
11:42Now it's all countdown.
11:44Now we've got to get these ready before that's ready.
11:46I'm going to stay out of your way.
11:47Their next job is to stick together the outer moulds and the inner moulds.
11:51The first three went without a hitch.
11:53Perfect.
11:54Like a glove.
11:56Oh, and it's just straight down.
11:59Yeah.
11:59Oh, I'm down.
12:01Oh, yeah.
12:02Down that side.
12:03Yeah.
12:04Yeah, boy!
12:05They put some sealant on the bottom of each case as well,
12:08just to make sure everything was locked in,
12:09and then they clamped them together.
12:11They tried the fourth one, it didn't quite match up,
12:13it needed a bit of sanding first, and then they were good to go.
12:16Sorry, so I had a bit of a brain fart,
12:17then I had to try and remember what buttons pressed.
12:18They're all labelled, labelled and marked.
12:21I know.
12:22Oh, hey, look at you!
12:25Balance to drive the fort then.
12:26No, I think it's the big cheese.
12:29If I was cheese, I'd definitely be the big cheese.
12:32Wheelie big cheese.
12:34In fact, I'd be such a big cheese, I'd almost be cow.
12:37That's a good point.
12:37If you were cheese, what cheese would you be?
12:39It's just really boring.
12:41I would be.
12:42You speak cheddar.
12:43I'd be Red Leicester.
12:44I love Red Leicester cheese.
12:47Cheddar is definitely the closest second.
12:49What would you be?
12:49I feel like I'd be Brie.
12:51Maybe a nice Camembert.
12:52Just a melt.
12:53Yeah, I'm a melt.
12:54Thanks, mate.
12:58Oh, and it just goes straight down.
13:00Done.
13:02This didn't...
13:02See, you know what I mean by like, three of them, not a problem.
13:05Happy to be closed.
13:06Let's crack on.
13:0720 minutes.
13:08This one?
13:08Nah, don't want to be a bell today.
13:10Not feeling it.
13:11Anthony and Sam had a very difficult question for me.
13:14If you were a cheese, what cheese would you be?
13:24See, the question is not what cheese do you like.
13:26No, it's what if you were a cheese.
13:28You woke up tomorrow.
13:29Oh no, I'm a cheese.
13:30What cheese do you want to be?
13:32The best answer I've got is like that American plastic cheese.
13:38Like, it's all superficial, you know?
13:40Yeah.
13:40Nobody's doing any hard work here.
13:41Yeah, it was late cheese.
13:43Yeah.
13:43Oh no, I'm not going that far.
13:46Holding my second camera there is May,
13:48who handles all the Foundry's social media.
13:50Because, yes, John Taylor's is the last working British Bell Foundry.
13:54But they also have some other lines of work.
13:56Installing the bells, advising on bells and bell towers.
13:59And there's also the Bell Foundry Trust,
14:01which is a small museum and heritage attraction doing tours.
14:03And they have outreach to do.
14:05There's not the demand for bells that there once was.
14:09The bells they're casting today are for a church down in Cornwall.
14:12And the raw material is that church's old bells,
14:15which were cast in 1883 by that exact foundry.
14:19There's nothing wrong with the metal itself,
14:20it's just that after more than 140 years of summer heat and winter cold,
14:24while being repeatedly hit with hammers,
14:27I mean, frankly, I wouldn't sound good after that.
14:29The bells, well, they don't sound so good either.
14:31But you can't fit a whole bell inside a furnace,
14:34so they need smashing into pieces.
14:37Ta-da!
14:39These were made in this building,
14:42a hundred and, well, however long 1883 was.
14:45They've come home to where they were made.
14:46They were made up there on those tables, with the same kit.
14:49And they will become four new belts.
14:51Yeah.
14:53All right.
14:54I'll call it that.
14:54But that means that someone's got to hit him with a slight chap.
14:57Yeah, I think there's some graph to do now.
14:58I set up a couple of cameras, but before we started,
15:00Anthony did show me that the lettering on the new bells won't just be similar,
15:04it's made with the exact same metal stamps.
15:07These are the original stamps.
15:10Oh!
15:12There you go.
15:15They're the same, they're the same, they're the same stamps.
15:22And so they swung the sledgehammer,
15:24and started to smash up the bells with very little ceremony.
15:37It's only gone first, so that now the next person that hits it,
15:40and it breaks apart, he did all the graph.
15:42Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
15:43Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
15:48Someone else's go!
15:50Ah!
16:03That's okay!
16:04Sorry!
16:05That's what it's there for!
16:06I'll get the gopher out of range, we're fine.
16:09They've offered to let me swing the hammer.
16:12This is my very little gesture for swinging the hammer.
16:18This is going to be embarrassing.
16:20How long did it take you to be able to swing the hammer properly?
16:22Oh, maybe a year.
16:24Right.
16:25That was my first question.
16:27Have you ever swung a sledgehammer?
16:29Yes.
16:31Not that often, many years ago.
16:33I mean, it's pretty self-explanatory, but all your weight is obviously at one end.
16:38For swinging, you can bring up, obviously the momentum will take it up,
16:43and then as you come down, slide your hand down and follow through with your whole core.
16:48Because we've seen people try and go like,
16:52and that's how you break a back, pull out a shoulder.
16:54Yeah.
16:56All kinds of things.
16:56And you want to be aiming for just sort of anywhere there.
16:59Just anywhere there.
17:06I hate this bit!
17:07This is difficult!
17:12Yeah, it doesn't.
17:15It's not bad for a fast, it's happening.
17:21Hey!
17:22It's going!
17:22That's cracked it!
17:23It's going!
17:24That's cracked it!
17:26Changing tone!
17:28I mean, I do feel a bit guilty, cracking a belt for a V83.
17:32Everyone always does.
17:34But it's got to be done.
17:41Well, that's meat's up and out.
17:42Are you sure?
17:43Not sure.
17:44I'd love to say I can do it, but...
17:46Well, you cracked it.
17:47You did?
17:47I cracked it.
17:48Yeah.
17:50Yeah, I didn't do that.
17:59That's a tough bell.
18:01That is a very tough bell.
18:03I was waiting for you to just, like, ping and it blow apart.
18:06I was like, oh, okay.
18:07Maybe we've actually given him, like, the hardest one to do.
18:09It is a very tough bell.
18:14You okay?
18:14Yeah, it's just hard work.
18:17While they smashed up the rest of the bells,
18:20May gave me a tour around the workshops,
18:22because they've got a huge space where they make the frames for the bells,
18:24and a load of other stuff besides,
18:26and where they do the tuning, which is a process that involves steadily
18:29and carefully shaving down the cast bells until they're exactly on pitch.
18:34And the offcuts, the swarth from that bell tuning, that goes back over to be raw material for new bells.
18:41Arm down.
18:42Arm down.
18:43Before we put big chunks in the furnace, we recycle all the bell shippings, though,
18:48like the offshoot tuning.
18:50Right.
18:50So we weigh out a load of them, put them in the furnace first,
18:54because then they make, like, a soft base for us to drop all the sharp pointy metal onto.
19:00That alone is probably 15 kilos.
19:03Any bigger than that.
19:06It's heavy water.
19:08You don't need the gym.
19:09I feel actively guilty just standing here with the camera,
19:12but I'm well aware that helps safely.
19:14But varying the reason will not let me get my hands near that furnace.
19:20How good's your aim?
19:21Hold that.
19:24There you go.
19:28I asked Josh.
19:30He said it'd be mozzarella.
19:36The furnace started belching out green fire, burning off a load of impurities,
19:41slowly heating up and then melting the metal.
19:43This is only just over hot.
19:45When we smashed up that bell and put all this in, that's about hot.
19:53We've still got another, see, about 5, 6, 50 kilos to go.
19:57Remember earlier that they said the floor is just one giant sand pit
20:00and that the bells have to cool slowly, as slowly as possible,
20:03to get the structure and the sound right?
20:04Well, the best way to insulate those bells and stop them cooling too fast
20:08is to dig them into the sand pit.
20:14That's the bottom bit that had the core on.
20:16And this is the top bit that you saw as lowering down over the core.
20:20And now they are met in the middle.
20:22So inside here, there is a cavity that will run the entire length up to the top of the bell,
20:28where once this pit's been dug, we'll lower it in
20:31and then we will put a box on top and that's where we pour into
20:35and then it'll flow and fill the whole cavity.
20:37You're seeing a montage here.
20:39This took an hour, even with the excavator.
20:48It's so nice that you do all these bits now.
20:51Well, it was going to happen eventually.
20:53No, I know, but I spent so many years having to do it myself.
20:58Oh, it was such hard work.
21:00And that's where the multi-metals will go.
21:03Yep, that's the pouring bush.
21:04That pouring bush is made with the same chemically bonded sand
21:07as the inner core of the bell.
21:08It sets in just a few minutes and then it has to be protected
21:11with the same graphite layer on top,
21:13which means they also need to get cured.
21:29So you see how smoky it is?
21:32Yeah.
21:32Yeah, that means it's more than enough.
21:37So when it melts, it creates like a crust on top.
21:40You have to break through that crust, go through my pre-flight checks,
21:44make sure we've got everything we need.
21:46Just final wait now, and then we're all good to go.
21:49We were joined by half a dozen folks over from the workshop
21:51who were ready for their part in a well-practiced routine.
21:54I was given a heat-resistant suit along with gloves, helmet and face guard.
21:58We were joined up on the balcony by visitors on a tour,
22:01including folks from the church whose bells they were recasting.
22:04Anthony, I'm just going to check with you one more time.
22:06My job is to stay behind you.
22:07Yeah, so just stay with me.
22:08All right.
22:09And you're all good.
22:11Everybody where they need to be.
22:13I'm going to assume yes.
22:14Cool, scrap on.
22:15They don't pour directly from the furnace into the bell casings,
22:18because then they'd have to somehow move the whole furnace.
22:21Instead, the glowing molten metal at around 1,200 Celsius
22:26goes into a smaller pouring ladle.
22:32Are you nervous?
22:34Yes.
22:35I'm always nervous.
22:36This was metal pouring like water.
22:39Your brain thinks it's water and thinks it's got the properties
22:42and weight of water.
22:43And I know it sounds obvious to say it out loud,
22:46but that has the weight and inertia of metal,
22:49because it is metal.
22:52Wait, where's Tom?
22:53Did he wipe that?
22:53Please, behind me.
22:54Here.
22:54If at any point you feel like you're going to get showered,
22:57tuck your shoulders in.
22:58Tuck your shoulders in, okay.
22:59Yeah, protect your neck.
23:00Got it.
23:03He should be fine, but they're little tricks that you pick up over time.
23:06Yeah.
23:08That's currently hotter than a volcano.
23:11Okay.
23:13Every day for you.
23:16Well, good news, my camera is working.
23:19That's good.
23:20That'll do you, Bill.
23:21Because we don't get a second take at that.
23:23The metal is giving off its own light,
23:25it's illuminating the space around it and our faces.
23:28The cameras can't quite deal with it, but there's detail in the surface,
23:31little imperfections that aren't glowing as much.
23:35Looks like the crumble.
23:37So now we're going to pick it up, spin it round,
23:39and then I'm going to take all the impurities off the top.
23:45This is...
23:46quite a lot.
23:47Then we'll put it down, we'll put the lid on,
23:49and then we'll go down and, well, we'll have a look,
23:51we'll have a look, sort of gauge it by eye what the temperature's looking like,
23:55which I think is going to be really hot.
23:56They used the overhead crane to move the pot of extremely dangerous molten metal
24:00across to the moulds.
24:02You can put it down, we'll leave it for a minute,
24:03because that is way too hot.
24:06So it's too hot right now?
24:07Yeah.
24:08All it'd do is we'd pour it in,
24:09and it would just absolutely obliterate the mould surface.
24:13Right.
24:13So it would cast the bell, but all the finish would just be horrendous.
24:16Right.
24:17So, but then too cold, you just go bang, and you just get a slab.
24:21Anthony wasn't using a thermometer or an infrared camera there,
24:23he was looking at the pot and from experience and knowledge just going,
24:27that's too hot.
24:28That knowledge was passed down to him by the people who trained him,
24:31and he's passing it on to Sam, and so the chain goes on for centuries.
24:36But see how it's like smoking out of every…
24:38Yeah.
24:39And that, yeah, shouldn't be normally doing that.
24:41Okay.
24:43So we've got to wait for it to cool a little.
24:45Excellent.
24:46Told you this bit's chill.
24:49Yeah, Bill, if you woke up tomorrow and you were cheese,
24:52what cheese would you be?
24:53I'm still, mate.
24:54So when everybody sees us on the balcony and they think,
24:55well, being really serious and professional, this is what we're asking
24:58when the visors are down and no one can hear us.
25:00And there's quite a few spectators up there as well.
25:03Hello!
25:04So you see how now, look, it's all sort of calming down?
25:07I mean, I hope so.
25:08I don't know what's showing up on camera,
25:09because it's so brilliant compared to everything else around.
25:12I reckon we're good for the first one.
25:14All right.
25:15Here's the crucial moment.
25:17Weeks of work and hard graft led up to this.
25:20One person, Josh, he was controlling the position of the bucket on the crane.
25:23Sam was controlling the pour.
25:24He's rotating the pot to keep the flow of molten metal steady.
25:28Keep going Sam, keep going Sam, keep going Sam, keep going Sam.
25:30You're in the lip.
25:31You ready?
25:31Yeah, ready when you are, mate.
25:33Nice and steady.
25:35And Anthony was controlling the flow, watching when it's nearly full
25:38and providing just a bit of movement in the top
25:40to make sure everything's flowing nicely and it's a constant stream.
25:43I don't know if it's shown up on camera,
25:45but there's a skin of slightly cooled metal on top,
25:50and then just liquid pouring out underneath it.
25:54We did pour a core in this one, didn't we?
25:56Well, yeah.
25:57Oh, got it, there we go.
25:59Fill the bush.
25:59And then they moved on to the next bell.
26:01They started with the smallest and they're working up.
26:03Nice and steady, Josh.
26:04Yep.
26:05Good lad.
26:06You ready?
26:06Yep.
26:07Here we go.
26:08These are a bit bigger, this one's a bit bigger, so.
26:10Only two inches.
26:11Oh?
26:12Only two inches.
26:13Makes all the difference, mate.
26:15Don't let anybody tell you it doesn't.
26:17Ooh, got it.
26:18I believe, yep, got it, got it, got it, got it.
26:20Look at that, it's spilling it.
26:22Two bells down, two to go.
26:23They dumped a few handfuls of sand on the top of each one
26:25once it's poured as insulation.
26:27I'll explain what the folks behind were doing in a minute.
26:29Yeah, ready when you are, Sam.
26:30Yeah, nice and steady.
26:32You're justling it through and making sure it doesn't stick.
26:34Yeah.
26:35Basically, yeah.
26:35I'm controlling the flow so that it's a constant stream going in.
26:41Got it.
26:42Right.
26:42With all those done, one final bell.
26:44The big one.
26:45Are you a bit warm?
26:47Yep.
26:49Right.
26:50Last one.
26:51Here we go.
26:52Nice and steady, Sam.
26:53Yeah.
26:53Ready when you are.
27:00There was an air of quiet concentration over the whole group now.
27:05Everything seemed to be going okay.
27:06Sam was pouring the metal at exactly the right speed.
27:09The level in the pouring bush was staying exactly where it should be,
27:11with the inflow matching the outflow.
27:13But as we got near to the end of the last bell,
27:16Anthony realised something.
27:18Oh, there is a lot left.
27:20There's a lot left.
27:21There's a lot left.
27:22The team had worked out the mass of the bells that they were putting in,
27:25and the mass of the bells that would be coming out,
27:27but it could only be an estimate.
27:29And there was too much molten metal remaining.
27:31The bell mould was about to be full,
27:34and they can't let the remaining metal cool in the ladle,
27:36because they'd never get it out again.
27:37Right, Tom, I need you to go that side please, mate.
27:39Mate, I need you to follow him.
27:40As soon as the last bell was poured, Sam cut off the flow,
27:43and then very, very quickly got to digging.
27:45Oh my goodness.
27:47And as fast as he can dig,
27:48with a thousand-plus Celsius pot of molten metal next to him,
27:52that hole was getting filled up.
27:54So that's just the excess.
27:55Yeah, so we'll repurpose that.
27:57Right.
27:58So that'll get recycled again and again.
28:00Yep.
28:00Once that's cooled, they can use the crane and forklift
28:03to pull out the ingots of metal, break them up and use them again,
28:05but it does mean there was some very heavy and unexpected work for Sam.
28:10It's warm back here.
28:12Is it?
28:12Yeah.
28:13I'm all right here.
28:14Shut up.
28:17Go on, Sam.
28:18You're nearly there, kid.
28:19I'm so proud of you.
28:22Oh, go on, Sam.
28:25You okay, Sam?
28:26Yeah, it was just a bit warm.
28:27Yeah, that's fair enough.
28:28Which means there's one last thing to explain,
28:30and which I got to have a go at.
28:32What are they doing poking sticks into the molten metal?
28:35If you take the bar above my hand,
28:36don't put any resistance.
28:38Yeah.
28:39Right, hang on, don't put any resistance.
28:41Feel that.
28:41Yes.
28:42That's the top of the core.
28:43Okay.
28:44It is imperative we do not hit that,
28:47because remember there's a hole straight through the middle.
28:48Yes.
28:49If we hit through that, all that vanishes.
28:52This is feeding the bell, agitating the top of it just a little to make sure there's no
28:56air bubbles, no weird inconsistencies, it's all just solid metal.
29:00I'm going to let go of the bar, it's yours.
29:02See how it's like kind of spongy?
29:04Oh, yeah.
29:04Yeah, that's metal structure starting to burn.
29:07Right, and actually I can see what was completely liquid is now just slightly sticking to it.
29:13So now just big circles and you're up and down and you can gently touch that mushy bit.
29:17I am not going to gently touch that mushy bit.
29:19I'm not going to risk it.
29:20Well, you never thought you'd hear today.
29:22All right.
29:24I'm going to give that back to you.
29:25Thank you so much for letting me try that.
29:27I'm just...
29:28As soon as these are all fed, that's it.
29:30Day's done.
29:32Um, folks, I hate to be the master of ceremonies here,
29:35but I think they deserve a round of applause for that.
29:37Oh, absolutely not.
29:49Oh, look at that.
29:51So which ones are the new ones, and which ones are the refitted ones?
29:57So the new ones are this one?
30:00Yep.
30:01That one, that one, and the one over there.
30:05Which are four, three, four, five and six.
30:07Wow.
30:16Two to three.
30:19Two to four.
30:26Two to five.
30:29And if you're wondering about the numbers that are being called out,
30:31that's a future video on my road trip across England.
30:40Next time, I hunt for invisible chimneys in the sky and make this noise.
30:44No.
30:46Yeah!
30:47He's like, oh my gosh, that's three.
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