Bell foundry Pfundner

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Bell 1 (Bishop bell) of the dome to Eisenstadt 3183 kg, clay b0, poured from Pfundner 1960

The bell foundry Josef Pfundner was a bell foundry in Vienna and today, as an industrial museum, it is one of the largest bell collections in the world.

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The foundry was founded in 1906 by Josef Pfundner, who was a non-ferrous metal caster. The company used the traditional sand molding process . In the first few years no bells were cast, and Pfundner had no experience with bell casting. The company only started manufacturing bells after the First World War , as demand was particularly high after the war.

The impetus for the production of bells came from a misunderstanding: the mayor of his home town asked Pfundner to cast a bell for this place, although he had not yet dealt with the casting of bells. Despite his lack of experience in bell casting, Pfundner took the risk and cast his first bell in 1926. The bell rib for it was designed by his son Josef Pfundner junior, who at that time was still a student of technical chemistry at the Technical University of Vienna . For many years, Pfundner junior dealt intensively with the sound behavior of bells and continued to develop the Pfundner rib named after him , also in collaboration with the Department of Church Music at the Vienna Music Academy . It resembles the bell rib of the famous Gloriosa in Erfurt Cathedral and, like this, is of the octave type, i.e. H. the individual partials of the bell are perfectly tuned, with the lowest part (undertone) being an octave below the nominal . At that time, other foundries in Austria still predominantly used the tonally less favorable seventh ribs (undertone a seventh below the nominal), as had been common since the Baroque period , and only switched to octave ribs later.

Deviating from the traditional clay molding process, Pfundner senior developed a sand molding method for bell casting, which he also patented . This enabled him to deliver within a shorter period of time and to produce more bells than the competition.

By 1938 a total of 1,465 bells had been cast, including the bells for the collegiate church of St. Peter in Salzburg .

During the Second World War , bell casting was banned due to the lack of raw materials. The foundry had to retreat to its second mainstay, industrial heavy and light metal casting. During this time, for example, aluminum castings were made for aircraft engines.

From 1941 onwards, the churches had to hand over most of their bells during the so-called bell campaign . Only historically particularly valuable bells were excluded. As a rule, each church had only one bell, usually the smallest. The majority of the delivered bells were melted down and used for war purposes. Only a few bells returned from the assembly camps after the end of the war. This created a great need for new bells after the end of the war. At that time about 150 employees poured in three shifts. The sand molding process offered Pfundner a great competitive advantage.

After 1945 a total of around 5150 bells were cast, including the 11-part main bell of St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna as the most important work .

After the greatest demand in Austria had been covered, Pfundner turned to export and delivered to Finland (e.g. Turku Cathedral ) and Yugoslavia, but also overseas.

The foundry also operated artificial casting for artists such as Fritz Wotruba and Herbert Boeckl .

In 1970, however, the last bells were cast and the company closed. The self-developed technologies, bell ribs, models for the bell decorations, etc. were sold to the Grassmayr bell foundry , where some of them are still in use today.

The last family member of the company was Martin Pfundner. Josef Pfundner's son, born in 1930, joined the company after studying chemistry at the Technical University of Vienna , where he was an authorized signatory until 1971 .

Innovations and patents

  • Sand molding process for bell casting (patented)
  • Permanent templates for the bell rib: Reusable templates for each tone of the chromatic scale , which could still be adjusted to the exact pitch. In contrast, with the traditional clay molding process, each template is only used for one bell.
  • Tuning: by grinding down certain points, Pfundner was able to correct the tone of his bells after the casting (retuning of nominal and partial tone structure).
  • Welding bells: As the first company in Austria, Pfundner succeeded in welding cracked bells from around 1960. This enabled broken bells to be restored. This process was used on valuable bells to preserve them instead of re-casting them.
  • Improvements to electric ringers (multiple patents)
  • Special alloys and “mixed bells”: Immediately after 1945, the procurement of bell bronze was difficult and expensive, especially the tin required (approx. 20% of the alloy ) was in short supply. Like other bell foundries, before 1950, Pfundner cast several hundred bells from special alloys with a reduced tin content. Since the sound quality of bells made of special alloy does not come close to that of bronze bells, Pfunder combined both types into mixed chimes when casting whole chimes in order to achieve the best possible sound with minimal costs. Usually only the largest bell was cast from bronze, as this dominates the sound of the peal. The prime example of this was the 5-part bell of the Jennersdorf parish church from 1948, which was replaced in 1996.

Bell production

(excerpts)

  • During the Second World War, mainly newer bells were confiscated as a metal reserve, and most of them were melted down. Therefore only a few Pfundner bells from the time before 1945 have survived, mostly small copies. Fortunately, the most important work from this period has been preserved:
  • Stiftskirche St. Peter in Salzburg - 6-part chime on a flat 0 with a total weight of 12,693 kg, cast in 1927; The great St. Peter's Bell, weighing 5,698 kg and measuring 204 cm in diameter, is the largest bell that was ever made in this foundry.

In chronological order, the following important works date from the period after 1945:

  • Parish church Perchtoldsdorf : 6 bells on h 0 , cast in 1946 as a supplement to an older bell (today bell 4). Bell 3 cracked and was re-cast in 1978 by the Grassmayr bell foundry .
  • Wiener Neustadt Cathedral : 4 bells on h 0 , cast in 1950 and 1951 (large bell) as an addition to an older bell (today bell 2).
  • Eisenstadt Cathedral : 6-part bells on b 0 , cast in 1956 (bells 2 to 6) or 1960 (large bell).
  • Bell of the cemetery church of St. Karl Borromäus ("Luegerkirche") at Vienna's central cemetery : the only bell in this church has a particularly beautiful sound, has the tone c sharp 1 , and was cast in 1956.
  • Vienna Votive Church : 4 bells on b 0 , cast in 1956 as a supplement to an older bell (today bell 5). Bell 2 was re-cast by Pfundner in 1962 after a crack.
  • Schottenfeld Church : 4 bells on h 0 , cast in 1958 (bells 2 and 4) or 1963 (bells 1 and 3) as an addition to an older bell (today bell 5). Another old bell popped in 1963; it was replaced by the current bell 3 by Pfundner, welded, and is now in the bell museum.
  • St. Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna : 11-part bells on g 0 with a total weight of 11,394 kg, cast in 1960; the large Stephen bell weighs 5,221.5 kg and has a diameter of 198.7 cm.
  • Altlerchenfeld parish church : 6-part bell on a 0 , cast in 1961

Further individual works (selection):

  • 1947 and 1949 - Maria Taferl :
    • Bishop's anniversary bell: tone d 1 , 1,409 kg
    • Marienglocke tone e 1 , 1,100 kg
    • 2 more smaller bells
  • 1947 - Poysbrunn
    • Replacement for the woman of twelve : It was cast in 1959, tone f sharp 1 , 730 kg
  • 1958 - Perchtoldsdorf Hospital Church
    • Foundation by the quarry owner Karl Maier, clay a 2 , 61.9 kg, diameter 45 cm
  • see also parish church Schöngrabern

Bell ornament

Until about 1930, Pfundner bells were richly decorated with historicist decorations . For the first time in Austria, modern bell decorations were used for the bells of the collegiate church St. Peter in Salzburg, designed by the famous artist Jakob Adlhart .

The simple, modern decor is typical of Pfundner bells: a relief as well as the foundry mark on the coat and an inscription on the neck. There is also a disc crown with four coats of arms. All bells are polished on the outside.

Bell research

Josef Pfundner jun. also made special contributions to bell technology in Austria. Especially during the delivery of bells in World War II, he carried out inventory and sound analyzes. This research formed the basis of his book Tönendes Erz , which he published in 1961 together with the musicologist and bell expert Andreas Weißenbäck , and in which the historical bells in Austria up to around 1900 are presented for the first time.

Bell collection

Since the company's founder did not melt down cracked bells, which were irreparable but historically interesting, but kept them, some bells - a total of 17 pieces up to the Second World War - could be preserved. Most of them, however, were confiscated during the war, with only four remaining. After the war, the collection grew again, so that today it not only includes 84 Alpine bells, but also a Japanese bell. Most of these bells were cast in the crown lands of the monarchy, as well as in Switzerland. The oldest bell dates from 1242. The largest weighs 1331 kg and dates from 1498 in Basel . From the 1960s onwards, all bells that were previously beyond repair could be restored using the electric welding process , which Pfundner developed further for bells. All but two bells have been repaired.

See also

literature

  • The Pfundner bell collection ( Memento from March 9, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 7.5 MB) in the journal Denkma (i) l , published by the Monument Protection Initiative , edition 7/2011, p. 22 ff.
  • Jörg Wernisch: Bell customer of Austria . Journal-Verlag, Lienz 2006
  • Andreas Weißenbäck , Josef Pfundner: Sounding ore. The occidental bell as a sound instrument and the historical bells in Austria . Published by the Institute for Austrian Art Research of the Federal Monuments Office, Böhlau-Verlag, Graz-Cologne 1961

Web links

Commons : Glockengießerei Pfundner  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Siegfried Adlberger: Martin Pfundner - last bell founder from Vienna died. In: Austrian Church Music Commission (ed.): Singende Kirche , 2/2016, p. 124.
  2. ↑ Martin Pfundner on ÖAMTC accessed on August 30, 2011.
  3. ↑ a b Bells of the churches in Perchtoldsdorf , accessed on August 30, 2011.
  4. ^ Bells ( memento of September 2, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) in Maria Taferl, accessed on August 30, 2011.

Coordinates: 48 ° 10 ′ 9.5 ″  N , 16 ° 22 ′ 24.1 ″  E