Here’s the table loom

So, the estate sale.. As I mentioned I got some books and a table loom.  My bookshelves are so full that I can’t fit my new books in, so I’m selling some that I no longer use or have duplicates of.  I also have a stack of duplicate Handwovens I’ve needed to move out for a long time that I still haven’t listed. Laziness, pure laziness. Back to the estate sale.  The loom is a Studio of Handcrafts 24″ 8 shaft table loom with stand.  I searched the web trying to find pictures or more info and there’s not much out there, so I took several pictures and posted them on Flickr. Hopefully they’ll help someone else. I’d never seen a loom like this before.

Full frontal. Oops, forgot to put the top tray on before taking pictures. And look at that monstrous warp!

This is what I’d never seen.  The beater bar isn’t hinged at the bottom, nor is it a swinging beater.  It moves back and forth on this metal track.  It always hits the fell at a the same angle.

The wood looks great after it got a clean up.  I did have to make a small repair to it. There’s a metal pin that goes through the lamms. I guess the original one got lost as there was a thin cord, almost like electrical wire, used to replace it. The shafts wouldn’t stay in place because the replacement wire wasn’t solid and was bent. We went to the hardware store, bought a new metal rod, and now it’s good to go.

One more picture here. (If you want to see others, you can see the full set here)

The levers for shafts 1, 3, 5, and 7 are on the right side of the loom. The levers for shafts 2, 4, 6, and 8 are on the left side.

The back beam folds up which will save a little space, though not a whole lot.  The stand is adjustable and folds flat when you aren’t using it. It’s a heavy loom and if I were taking it to a workshop, I’d have to use something to wheel it around.  It handles teeny tiny warps just fine I may put my crackler sampler that I will eventually get around to doing on it instead of the floor loom to give it a better run through.

The pitfalls of windfalls

Thank you everyone for your input on the beginning workshops.  It wouldn’t be me teaching it.  I’m working with someone that is wanting to build her teaching repertoire and we were discussing just how it should be taught.  Unfortunately, we rent a room at a local college and don’t have a permanent space so we can’t extend the hours into a longer class.  While we do have until January to work this all out, it looks like we’ll at least be starting with pre-warped looms.

Last week I took a vacation from work. Tuesday through Monday. Seven glorious days to just relax and enjoy life. On Thursday morning, I went to an estate sale and bought some weaving books. The previous owner had stashed some money away in one of those books and let me tell you, I was doing the happy dance and thinking of the new toys I could buy for myself, and some that The Man could buy for himself.  That night, we ended up taking The Man to the emergency room for some severe stomach pain.  They ran some tests and couldn’t find anything, saying he may have gastroenteritis and he needed to make an appointment with a doctor as soon as possible.  Yesterday we went to the doctor, and he wants to do an endoscopy tomorrow. He thinks husband may have an ulcer that was caused by bacteria or some such thing.  While we do have insurance, by the time we pay the deductible and the percent of the bills, there goes that found money.

Also yesterday, I noticed one of the sprinkler stations was still running.  It had probably been running since at least the night before.  Long story short, the whole sprinkler system is hosed. Thankfully, it’s the time of year when we actually get some rain once in awhile so fixing it doesn’t have to be done today.

Money in, more money out.  Boo.

Oh, and I also bought a 24″ 8 shaft table loom at the sale.  More on that later.

Beginning weaving workshop opinions?

I’m the workshop planner for our guild this year and want to schedule a workshop for rank beginners, people who’ve never woven or touched a loom before. I’d like to hear some thoughts on beginning weaving workshops.  Keep in mind that the workshop has to fit in a day and a half (about 10 hours total time).

If you took a beginning weaving class, how was it taught? Was it on a rigid heddle loom or multi shaft loom? Did you warp it or was the loom already warped? Do you wish the class had been taught differently? If so,what would be different?

If you teach classes, do you start the student with a pre-warped loom, or do you teach them how to warp from the first step? Which do you find is more successful, or keeps people interested in weaving without them getting discouraged?

Any other thoughts or opinions you’d like to add are welcome.

 

 

January 16

There I go again, just leaving you all on the edge of your seats wondering what I’m up to.  The last few months of the year, I wove quite a bit.  Four scarves (2 for each daughter), 6 (I think) false damask towels, and 4 or so waffle weave towels.  I didn’t get pictures of the scarves before I handed them off to the girls, I only have before-wet-finishing pictures of the waffle weave towels, and the false damask towel pictures are still in the camera. I’d show you pictures but they’re crap – washed out and don’t show the colors well.

I also tried my hand at tying on a new warp to an existing one, and figured out why my Gilmore and I didn’t see eye to eye (the issue was not me :p but I will fix it). I have not hemmed any of the towels yet.

I’ve kind of fallen into a weaving funk, if not just a general winter funk.  I want to weave, I just don’t know what I want to weave.  Everything sounds appealing, yet nothing sounds appealing.  I might be coming out of it though.  On the WeaveTech list, Susan Wilson posted about her new book on Crackle weave being available (click on See What’s Inside to see a couple of pages from the book).  After reading about it, I suggested to the guild librarian that it might be a good book to add to the library, which she did.  And since I suggested it, I got to borrow the book first.  I got it at the meeting on Saturday and after just a few pages in, I’m extremely interested in getting to know this weave better.  I’m anxious to read more and put a learning warp on the loom.  I have The Crackle Weave book by Mary Snyder* in my personal library and have had for quite awhile but I’ve never paid too much attention to it.  Susan’s book, Weave Classic Crackle & More, has detailed pictures – very pretty pictures – that The Crackle Weave book doesn’t and now I see what can actually be done with it. Not that I haven’t seen crackle woven before, I’ve just never taken the time to understand what makes crackle what it is.

Maybe picking a topic and learning about it will get me out of this ho hum blah.

I also took a week off work.  Right now I just hate it. Despite being able to roll out of bed and work in my pj’s, I dread getting up during the week and being chained to my computer.  It’s one thing to spend hours surfing and reading things that are interesting, and something totally different spending hours doing something that is boring the hell out of you. My brain needs a rest. Though I don’t know if studying crackle will be considered a rest or not.

*The Crackle Weave by Mary E. Snyder is no longer in print but you can find the book (I would call it more like a booklet) used pretty cheap.  It’s like a workshop in booklet form.

Again with the bleh

I sampled and I sampled to get the hearts just right, and then I screwed up.  So, the hearts scarf is done but not happy with it.  The tops of the hearts just aren’t right.  Too thin on one side, too thick on the other.  They aren’t like the 9th and final sample that I was happy with.  This is because sometimes I just do stupid stuff.  Like handwash the samples and get them like I want, then throw the actual scarf in the washer where it gets more agitation.  Which caused me agitation.

And, I had a warp thread break, the one right in the middle where it will show up the most. Eh, people won’t notice it when the scarf is worn but I just happened to take a picture of the spot when trying to get the reverse side. Of course

And then I folded the scarf in half and found that my reverse point was not at the halfway point. We’ve all known for a long time that I can’t count stitches, now it seems I can’t count hearts.

To add insult to injury, my other project for the guild challenge also turned out bleh.  I didn’t want to make more towels so decided on a bag.  I knew the minute I started putting the warp on the warp beam that I wasn’t going to like it.  No way in hell I’m carrying around this as a bag.

This is after wet finishing but the color isn’t right

The colors are actually like this

This may turn into a couple of extra wide dish towels, or it might rot in the closet until I get over my irritation.

Road trip, the story is as long as the trip

Someone had a loom for sale so I emailed them.  (Because I need another loom like I need a hole in my head.)  After not hearing anything for a day, I emailed again.  After two days of not hearing anything, I assumed the loom had sold.  But I finally got an email on the second day.  My previous emails had went to spam, I was the second person to respond, and yes the loom was still available, please call her.   I assumed the first responder had not taken the loom. I called and made arrangements to pick it up the next day (yesterday).  I told her it was a 3 1/2 hour drive and I could be there by 3:30.

The Man got off work early to go with me so as soon as I got off work, we headed out.  We got there early, a few minutes before 3:00.  I rang the doorbell, no one answered.  I tried to call and got an answering machine.  No big deal since after all, we were early.  The ocean was only a couple of blocks away so we went there for a few minutes.  Back to the house at 3:30, still no answer to the doorbell.  By 4:30, I’m getting pretty pissed.  Either there was an emergency or she had sold the loom and wasn’t considerate enough to tell me before I drove close to 200 miles. I called one last time and left a message that we would stick around local until around 5:00 but wouldn’t be able to stay past that but to please call me on my cell if they got home around that time.  We were just about to leave when a vehicle pulled up and parked in front of the house.  It was her daughter.  I explained that I was supposed to be there to pick up a loom at 3:30 and no one was home.  The daughter called her mom and at 5:00 we were looking at the loom.

I’d say long story short but too late for that.  The seller had emailed her phone number to both me and the first person who emailed her.  After I called her, the other person she had given her phone number to also called her.  The other person apologized and said she couldn’t take the loom, had decided to do other things.  The seller thought that it was me calling, changing my mind, not the second person with her phone number, so they weren’t expecting me to come pick it up.  The seller felt so bad for us waiting for so long that she knocked some money off the loom.

Now I have a 4 shaft Schacht Baby Wolf (minus the stroller wheels that it was supposed to have, couldn’t be found).  The plan was to use it for workshops but there’s no way I can get that thing in and out of my car’s trunk by myself.  Everyone seems to like weaving on them and it doesn’t take up much room when it’s folded so it’s going to be here for a little while.

I asked The Man to make a little tension device for my electric bobbin winder.  The winder is old, very old.  I’d say no newer than the 1960′s based on the wiring.  I was taking it to The Man to explain what I wanted and a ball bearing falls out of the motor.  He tried taking the motor apart and could find no other ball bearings in it.  I’ve either been using this thing with only 1, the others are extremely well hidden inside, or they also fell out and rolled far enough that I just haven’t found them yet.  I’ve gotten very spoiled with the electric double ended winder and I don’t want to live without it.  New ones are expensive so I’m hoping to find a cheap motor at a local sewing machine shop.

 

Panel revealed

You get to see what it looks like through one of the panes.  I tried taking pictures of the full length and the camera can’t pick up enough detail.  IF, and that’s a BIG IF, I were to do this again, I would do what I did the first time I made them, shorten the lace boxes.  I liked them better square.

Still working on the hearts.  I put enough warp on to create two 70 inch scarves + 30 inches for sampling +30 inches for waste.  I think I’ve already gone past my quota for sampling, trying to tweak the hearts to get them to look like I want them to.  I still have more adjusting to do and will hopefully get them the way I want soon.