Cross Purposes

One of the things we forgot to tape for the DVD The Efficient Weaver was how I rough sley the reed as a raddle and how it gets put into the loom.  Since someone also asked about transferring the cross, here is a photo essay showing those steps.

Laying the reed across a couple of small boxes, I sley the warp into the reed.  In this instance I want 10 epi, but have wound two ends at a time.  Since you never want to separate the loops at the end of the warp chain, a complete loops goes into one dent, then three are left empty to achieve 10 epi density.

Once done, the reed is flipped over top of the lease sticks.

The loop of the warp is now picked up and held by a third lease stick.

The bundle of reed and lease sticks is laid across the bin (or box) and carried to the loom.  In this instance I also threw in the cones I expect to use for weft, just to keep everything together.

The reed is inserted into the beater (see picture below) and the third lease stick holding the loops is carried to the back of the loom.  The apron rod then picks up the loops from the stick.  In this picture you can see the loops are messy.  These uneven loops straighten out quickly by going to the front of the loom and gently pulling on the warp chain at the choke tie, which hopefully has done it's job and not allowed any unevenness to transfer beyond the choke to to the rest of the warp.

The loops have been straightened out.  Since this yarn is textured, it needs a little extra grooming.  I do this by grasping the choke tie, applying gentle tension on the chain and then sliding the lease stick back and forth to encourage the threads to even out.

The weight is applied to the warp chain to provide tension for beaming and the lease sticks are raised as close to the warping valet as possible without snagging any of the threads.  The goal here is to have equal tension on the threads.  Snags will increase tension on those threads caught up. in the snag.

The warp is beamed by rolling the warp forward.  The lease sticks will descend to the breast beam at which point the weight is removed and moved further down the chain and lease sticks raised as high as they can easily go.  Repeat, inserting warp packing, until done.  Here I've divided the warp chain into two sections.  If I didn't the warp is wide enough that the outside ends will have more tension than the inside ends for the last few feet.

Removing the masking tape (or whatever is used to secure the lease sticks) the stick closest to the reed is tipped up on it's edge to form a shed.

Using a longer set of lease sticks I insert one into the shed behind the beater and...

slide it to the back where it is inserted into the Angel Wings (sold by Purrington Looms).  I've found the front set of holes is about perfect for me to thread from.

Removing the first lease stick, the second one now forms the other shed of the cross and another long lease stick picks up the shed behind the beater and...

gets inserted into the front hole of the Angel Wings.  The clamps hold the lease sticks so that they can't pop out of the Angel Wings and the warp is secure.

I cut the loops at the beater and the warp is now ready to be threaded.