The bells of Pukenamu Queens Park's Carillon chime once again with its restoration complete

Whanganui will once again hear music coming from the Carillon in Pukenamu Queens Park, as the restoration of the monument has been completed. Photo / Bevan Conley

Bells will chime out over Pukenamu Queens Park in Whanganui once again with the park's Carillon fully restored and back in operation.

The Carillon was originally donated to the town by Dutch businessman PJ Zweggers en Zonen in 1981 to mark the opening of his Farm Equipment Company's factory in Whanganui.

The Carillon was taken down in March this year so its 18 electric bells could be restored to their original condition, according to the Whanganui District Council.

The council said the restoration was completed by local companies Adrian Barnes Electricians (ABE) and MTR Engineering.

An MTR spokesperson said the company handled structural repairs to the frame of the monument.

Initially, they took it down off of its plinth and disassembled it, taking the bells down from the frame.

ABE Electrician Nathan Hawtree said they were in charge of the electrical work and of refurbishing the bells once MTR had taken them off the frame.

"We took it because a lot of electrical work had to be done on the bells themselves," he said.

This included a complete replacement of all the solenoids and hammer mechanisms that ring the Carillon's bells.

This part of the repairs took months as the replacement hammers were manufactured by the company that made the originals, Dutch company Petit & Fritsen, and took two months to make, plus another month to be shipped here.

While the work on the bells was being completed, the frame was sent away to Spectrum Powder Coating in Auckland to be refinished.

Hawtree said ABE refurbished the bells and refitted them to the frame once it got back from being powder-coated.

Hawtree said it then took a day of tuning to get the bells to play the right notes, which involved little tweaks to each bell to get them on-song.

"[It involved] a lot of climbing up of ladders and adjusting the hammers so we got a nice tone out of the bells."

Once the frame was reassembled and reunited with its bells, MTR mounted it back on its plinth.

The Carillon is now chiming once again and will play each hour from 6am to 6pm daily, automatically cycling through 12 different tunes.

Hawtree said it felt good to have the project completed and the bells playing once more.

"It's always good to get something like that up and running," he said.