New Addition to the Collection

Looms are keeping me busy.  I realized I started this post quite a while ago, sometime in late winter, and never finished it.

I recently had an opportunity to add a very large loom to my studio. I don't recall how I came across the Craig's List posting, but it was only three hours away. After checking with the seller and a couple others familiar with the Bexell Cranbrook countermarche or counterbalance looms, I found it could be upgraded to an 8-shaft loom, so I decided to make the purchase.

Near the end of February, my daughter Carolyn and I collapsed the stow-and-go seats in the van and took off for Midland, Michigan to meet my new loom and former owner Maryanne.

Here is Maryanne saying goodbye.

Here is a photo of how it is supposed to look.

On that day, though, it was just a pile of lumber, strings and chains in the back of the van.  We really had to squeeze to get the two side pieces diagonally in through the back hatch, but we were successful.

A bonus with the purchase were the extra reeds, shuttles, rug yarn, and warping reel.

Bob was a good sport and helped cart all the pieces upstairs above my studio and then did most of the assembly with my assistance.

See that beater?  It was designed for making tight rugs.  It is heavy!

It is a great loom for assembling.  Pegs and no bolts make is so easy.

Above Bob's head in the foreground is the jack mechanism for the countermarche.  There is definitely room to add four more shafts.  We just need to go purchase the hardwood.  We will need to cut eight more jacks, four treadles, eight shaft bars, four lower lamms and four upper lamms.  When I do the additions, I will probably use Texsolv cord instead of chains for all the tie-ups.

This baby is ready to warp!

I decided to try and use the four yard warp that was still on the warp beam.  It was a bit tangled, so I got a bit of weight on it and started dangling it down the stairway to get it straightened.

There was no cross, so here I am inserting a lease stick into the warp at the back.  It was a pretty warp, with lots of colors, so it was worth trying to save.  Since every two warp threads were a different color, it was pretty easy to get the cross back onto the lease sticks.

Barbell weights work nicely to add tension to the warp when winding onto the warp beam.  It went on the loom quickly.

I started the first rug and then I let Carolyn take over.  This was her first weaving experience, and she took to it right away.

She had made a quilt from her fiance (now husband) Jeremy's old tee-shirts and we cut the scraps into strips for the rugs.

Even her kitties get a rug for under their food dishes.  A good use for the short bit of warp remaining.

By the end of March, we took the rugs off the loom.

The rugs now live in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and look very nice in Carolyn and Jeremy's kitchen.

Never So Thankful To See A Warp End!

This was one of my most hated warps!   I didn't have too much trouble with the paw fabrics or the first fabric, but this last fabric for T11 was nothing but trouble.  There were so many warp breaks, that I decided to measure another warp just in case I decided to throw in the towel with this one.  It sure was tempting, but I don't give up easily.  This was a very welcome sight, though, when I finally had enough woven.  Thankfully, the fabric is fulled and then fused with interfacing on the back, so it should be pretty stable when finished.

All these weights dangling off the back of the loom except for the two on the edges were weighting broken warps.  It's a good thing I had lots of hooks and fender washers.

The whole time I was weaving T-11, I was thinking I would use the side that I could see, but after finishing it and getting it off the loom, I decided the backside would be more suitable for a young man (my oldest grandson).  So here is what it looks like.  I was able to pull all the broken warps to the back, trim them fairly short, and then got the interfacing fused.  Marking, cutting, and sewing will come later this week.




 I dislike using table looms for anything but workshops, because they slow me down.  Someday, this little Glimakra Victoria will get a set of treadles, but for now, I'm doing what I can to make the weaving simpler.  Table looms have such a short area to actually weave, about an inch at best, that I was having to stop to release the ratchet too often.  Thank goodness I took a class from Kati Reeder Meek and learned about live weight tensioning.  It's such a sweet technique, especially for table looms.

I used a small cotton cord (less than 1/4" diam.) from the hardware store and some barbell weights that were not being used.  The cord is wrapped three wraps around the backbeam with no overlaps.  The heavy weights are hung on one end of the rope and a lighter counter weight on the other end.

So, which end gets the heavy weight?  On my loom, the warp is winding off from the inside of the loom, so that end of the rope gets the heavy weights.  If the loom had the warp coming off the outside of the loom, the heavy weights would go on that end of the rope.

Here is a closer photo.  The beam has to have a clear space in order for this to work.  This warp, which is only about 12" wide, has one five pound weight, two three pounders, and one two pound weight on the heavy end, and one two pound weight for the counterweight.  I tried eight pounds at first, but it wasn't enough.  Once the weights are installed and dangling, then the back ratchet can be released.  Now when I need to move my warp forward, I just turn it from the front.  I don't have to release anything, and it stays a constant tension.  I love it!  Thanks Kati!

Since this was my first time using the loom, except for a doubleweave class, I looked through my book of eight shaft patterns and picked a dornick twill because I liked the looks of it, and because the treadling had leavers grouped together.  I figured that would help speed things up, and made for a logical progression of leaver pulls.

I am quite happy with the resulting fabric, and am probably destined to add another bear to the Griswold bear family. 

This photo is more accurate for the color.  For scale, the woven black area is only 1" deep.  The fine gray yarn came from my Alice Griswold collection, and the black is from my stash.  It is a 9/2 size wool and is a bit thicker than the gray wool warp.  I need to weave about 52" for a bear, not counting the paws, and so far, I have almost 18".

Next photos will probably be when I finish T10 and T11.  Hopefully soon!