Halfway Heddled

Day 230: I've reached a milestone. I have half of 1024 heddled threaded. But back up a bit. I had to MAKE almost all of those 1024 heddles as well, tying them out of crochet thread, seven knots per heddle (two each to make three square knots, and one for extra security at the top). This is just the prep work, folks. The actual weaving is going to be a piece of cake because it's a traditional 2/2 twill. That means it's easier to thread than a lot of drafts, just 1-2-3-4 over and over. I still verify at the end of each colour repeat because it's easy to pick up a heddle from shaft 2 instead of shaft 3 when you're dealing with a forest of heddles. I've caught two errors where I did just that, but it was quick to unthread and re-do the sequence. Better to find out now than when all 1024 are threaded! I've always maintained that threading is where a weaver's true talent is demonstrated . Any dingbat can treadle properly if they don't let their attention wander, and errors are usually relatively easy to fix, but a thread in the wrong heddle can mean hours of work lost and needing to be redone. Verify! Verify! Verify! In this case, it's easy. For example, for every big yellow block I should have six heddles threaded on each of four shafts. When I'm done threading the block, I check. If one shaft has five and another has three, I goofed somewhere. The same principle applies equally to colour sequences or pattern repeats. At the end of each "unit," verify to be sure the right number of heddles are on each shaft. It'll save you major headaches in the end.

Making String Heddles

Day 136: When Max, my Bergman countermarch loom, came to live at my house, he was dressed with a minimal amount of string heddles. Before I could work on a project of any size, I had to tie more, which meant that I needed a jig so they would all be the same size. The odds and ends of lumber and nails I had in my garage weren't particularly inspiring, so I cast about for anything else I might use. I'd nearly given up when the cribbage board came to mind. The pegs allowed me to set the distance from the ends to the heddle eye in a perfect match to the existing heddles, and a warping tool gave me a way to store them without tangling until I had made a batch (I tie them off in bundles of 50). I made 400 on that first run, sufficient for any of the panel widths I normally use for overshot. I thought that would hold me for the rest of my life, but then I was given a gift of enough 16/2 tartan wool (made in Scotland!) to weave a summer shawl. Drafting it out, I determined that I would need 920 ends, i.e., 920 heddles...oh, let's say another 400 just to be on the safe side. I've been pecking away at it (tying heddles is not my favourite occupation, believe me) and am making substantial progress. By the time I get "Friend Evelyn" off Max, I'll have enough tied for the tartan shawl.

String Heddles

Day 118: One of the things I have to do before Max is fully functional is to make more string heddles. Yesterday, you saw my improvised jig (the cribbage board). So far, I have tied 125 new heddles to supplement those already on the loom. My old loom has roughly 200 per shaft, and on one notable occasion, I ran out while I was threading and had to shift some from a different shaft without losing what threading I had already done (about 3/4 of a large project). I'll spare you the details. Just suffice to say that I had to remove screws from the upper inner sides of some shafts while keeping other shafts elevated, then lower them to remove the corresponding screws at the bottom of the frame, thread on new heddles and then reverse the process to put it all back together again. The job required every single one of my father's tractor-starting words as well as some new ones I made up along the way. The takeaway from the experience was that you should always count first. In any event, my goal is to have 300 heddles on each shaft. Max came equipped with 100 per shaft, therefore for four shafts, I need to tie 800 total. I can do a smaller project for his christening and undoubtedly will do exactly that, but I'll keep pecking away at heddle-tying until I reach the finish line.

The Cribbage Jig

Day 117: Sometimes, I'm absolutely brilliant. Max still requires several things before he's fully operational. Certainly, I needed to order canvas for an apron for the warp roller and suitable cord for his tie-up, but while I'm waiting for those to arrive, I decided to tie more string heddles because there were only 100 on each shaft. You really need a jig of some sort to tie heddles uniformly, and I was running through all sorts of options for building one, but I didn't want to have to break out the bolt cutters to bite the heads off nails. Then it hit me: I had a fully adjustable jig in my closet...a cribbage board! I took one of the existing heddles, staked it out between pegs to set the proper distance for the length and placement of the eye, and I was in business. I tied 25 last night as a test and mounted them on one of Max's shafts. Perfecto! It's working so well that I may eventually replace all of the old heddles as well.