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.