Pulled off loom

I got the butterfly mug ruggs pulled off the loom.
There is a picture so you can see how much room I left between the motifs.
The butterfly at a slant I did first. I found out that my graphed pattern was too long.
I regraphed the butterfly, and tried again. The second attempt went much better.
I pulled the butterfly warp off my PVC loom and put it on bars for a backstrap.
I was able to get a tighter weave.
The third attempt went a lot smoother, but I started on the wrong pick, so my whole design was shifted over one warp, making the butterfly touch the frame.

To finish these butterfly mugrug, I will zig-zag stitch by hand with sewing thread to secure the last warp.

Misadventures in warping

I wanted to get pictures up quickly on warping the board to show the loom in use for people.


However, this resulted in a lesson on "how not to warp."

I warped in a hurry, and forgot half of the threads in the center section. I also did not preserve the cross. I thought (wrongly!) that I could just scoot the top border threads towards the top of the pegs on the warping board, and pass the balls of yarn under the already warped threads.

This ends up in a lesson in frustration!. Don't do it! The 'add in' center section ended up way, way too twisted, and way to loose. If I was trying to use a backstrap, I could not use this warp! In order to salvage the warp, I hand-picked a cross at the far end of the warp, while the warp was under tension from the weight- aka water bottle. Then I carefully slid the cross held by two sticks towards the 'front' end, untangling twisted warps as I went. When I got the end, where the twists would not let the sticks go any further, I stoped. I then carefully wound the extra warp on the back beam inserting a stick on each round to keep the warp kinda staight.

I added string heddles, and a lease bar, and then wove a few sticks into the warp to make a solid header. I wove about an inch, and then took pictures and put the loom in its "home" rather than our kitchen table.

Now, The the photograph shows a general clue as how to use the warping board. The drawing above shows a  correct path. This is the longest warp my board will give. I could have stopped at the upper right hand corner, or the lower left hand corner to get a shorter warp.

 

Happy weaving on warps with no tangles!

 

Indoneasian inspired warp-weighted loom

Two things inspired me today!

1) A posts on weavouluton about how one member was having problems finding a good place to warp up a band in order to get a good start to her project. I sent her a quick drawing of how show how a board and L brackets can make be used to make a funtional (but not pretty) warping board.

2) I was reading a PDF article from "The Arizona Site"... I.e. the On-Line Digital Archive of Documents on Weaving and Related Topics .(http://www.cs.arizona.edu/patterns/weaving/)

Here is the article:

Studies in Primitive Looms, Roth, H. Ling. Journal of The Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 47 (1917), 44 pages. Posted December 14, 2003. CD (HWDA07). SAMPLE PAGE. File size 3.7 MB PDF

This article  is part 3. The black and white drawing  is from Pg 23 of 44 of the PDF, or pg 345 as the pages are marked in the top corners.

A loom of this style is still used today in some parts of the Asian island nations, and if you do a picture search on "backstrap loom" some pictures from travel logs in indoneasia and asia will show these looms in still use.

 

Getting back to my loom: I had made this loom/support to weave a card-woven band while sitting next to my computer. It worked, but after I was done using it, it went on a "pile" and was leaned against and broke. More about why the failure happened later.

I gathered the loom, tools and new hardware I needed to fix the loom and took a picture.


The tool I use most often is a AA-battery powered screwdriver with a hex connector. ($8-$10, Walmart) Some drills bits come with a hex connector, and they work fine in the battery powered screwdriver. The drill bit drills a hole to start the screw into, a must if you don't want to split your wood. If I want to cut a board 'mostly straight'; I use the little jig saw. An edge that wavers back and forth 1 or 2 millimeters off the drawn line and between 87 degrees to 95 degrees is not a big deal (or noticable to a casual glance) for the end of a board, UNLESS you want to match it "square with the world" to another board. Then, I cut the board with a chop saw, or ask someone else to cut my peices with a table saw .

You can see that the little L-bracket I used to hold the front board broke in half! Observe the angle of the board compared to the large L-bracket. The small bracket broke because it is not designed for kinds of stresses (or the angle) that a leaning person puts against it. There is a huge difference between L-brackets, depending on the metal used to manufacture them and if they are 'cast' or just 'bent' to make the 90 degree angle. Look at the 2 matching L-brackets. Do you see the little 'dolup' of extra metal near the bend? (look at the 2 brackets on the ends, not the one in the middle) That extra metal gives strength and reinforces the bracket, and actually makes it a little bit stronger than the larger bracket next to it. I just gave you the super-simple explaination; ask your favorite mechanic or engineer for more information on metal types and stress loads.

It took me about 15 minutes to unscrew the old brackets, drill starting holes, and screw in the new brackets.

I want to use this loom to double as a warping-board, so I installed a extra bracket to keep a cross near the 'back' of the loom. Notice how I placed the stronger brackets at the front of the loom, and the weaker bracket as the cross-keeper. In the detail, you can see that my screws are not 'perfect'. This screw was put in at an angle on purpose so it would bite enough wood and not break though the top of the board.

I did not provide many measurements because this was a 'design as I went' project. I used what I had in the scrap pile. The bottom board was a rescued shelf. The brackets came from a clearance sale as I knew I would use them "someday". Yes, someday does actually arrive! The 'mending braces' (straight peices of metal with holes not used) will be used as a clamp similar to the way the wood with the eyebolts in the first picture of the broken loom. Be aware that this loom with this size brackets is not suitable for textiles wider than about 12". Anything wider would just put too much tension on the metal, and the brackets would fail.

For now, here is a discription of how I use the loom: The extra warp is rolled up on the 'back' board. I streach the warp from the back to the front and drape it over the front board and let it hang off the table. I slide the finished end of my band in between the two pieces of wood, and tighten the nuts finger-tight ---- no wrenches needed. Next, I attach one-liter bottles filled with water to the eye bolts to use as weights. The weights serve the same function as a backstrap --- to hold tension while I am weaving. The finished band just 'flops around' as I work, or sometimes I will roll the loose section and pin it out of my way. When the weights touch the ground, I slide the clamp back towards the loom. I intend this loom to weave trial pieces in order to practice new patterns, and other items less than 6 inches wide. The board is about 7 inches wide, and I have slightly less than 6 inches beween the brackets. I hope to post more pictures of the loom in use later.

Backstrap weaving footrest

ok.. I am back working on my blog after a long time!



Thanks to Laverne Waddington for encouraging me to go back and post things.

I have been working with of her instructions on backstrap weaving, but our living room does not have any good places for me to hook up a backstrap loom, and still watch the TV, and or face the room to visit with people. (I don't like to always have my back to the room.) I also intend to take my backstrap loom out for demos, and a lot of demo venues don't have any good places to hook up a loom as still be seen by the people walking past.


Here's my solution:


A foot brace hooked to a board to sit on with 3/8" diameter threaded rod.
The boards came from the scrap pile of lumber I keep in my shop. The striped blanket is a handy cushion. The longer peice of threaded rod is cut down to 21" so that it not longer than my 22" loom bars. The shorter piece of threaded rod is about 8" long. I set up the loom, adjusted the bolts so that the brace fit my legs, and then took the threaded rod back out to the shop and cut it about 1" longer than I needed it. The foot brace is 16" long, with 2 holes in the center, and I would not make it any shorter. (I have large feet; men's size 10 shoes or a 43 european size.) The long "hex nut" looking thing is a special connector I found at the hardwear store, for about $1.50. It connects the two pieces of threaded rod together.


The cross-peice that sticks up, can be loosened, and twisted down to the side, so it takes up less room. In the future, I will probablly make that piece a little longer, so that the loom bar does not rest on my feet.


So.. although my solution is not 'pretty' it is working. After I have lived with the brace for a while, I can use 'new' or 'better' lumber and the whole contraption will look prettier

The two pictures above are an 'overview'

of how the footbrace goes together without me sitting in it.

On the left, you can see a closer view of my hardwear.

Below is what I see while I am weaving.

Tablet weaving, gardening

Those are my 8 foot tall sugar pea vines.
That is the first blosom presenting.

I am weaving a band on my PVC loom.
The cards at the top are a reed, and the lower cards are the working cards. The section under the pin is all 4F turning.
The section above the pin is a combination of turning.
The pattern was found as part of "gudrum's tabletweaving thingy", a free computer program for tabletweaving patterns.

pin looms

I have been experimenting with pin looms, other wise know as loomette, or weavette. Here are pictures of my results.

The top square is done with 1 strand of size 80 tatting thread. that is about the same diameter as 'quiliting' sewing thread.

The second squre is done with 2 strands. The squares were done with pins pushed into a piece of foam, following the squres on 10sqi graph paper.

This is a diamond shaped loom. It is about 6" long on the longest diagonal.

I used nylon tape yarn. the loose diamond is done on every other peg.

The diamond peg loom is tricky to use, as the ribbon packs very tighlty.

flat fish

I had a sucessfull fishing trip the other day... I caught my fist 'keeper' fish, a flounder. The fish has eyes on the top of the head and blends perfectly with the bottom of the river. After learning to fillet the fish, it tasted wonderful!