Beaming with Tension

 This morning I got a question from someone that I feel others would also like to know about:

I have a question regarding weighting the warp when winding on. What factors might cause you to alter the weight you use? If I understand correctly weighting isn't necessarily about how much but how even but that being said I'm sure there are factors other than stretch of yarn that might affect how much. Thank you.

It may have been sparked by the photo I shared on Instagram yesterday:

The warp is the most recent place mat warp that I wove. The warp is 2/8 cotton at 20 epi, 11 meters long. It had been a while since I'd woven place mats - like a whole year or so - and it took a while to get comfortable weaving this quality of cloth again. On this third warp I was comfortable enough to pay attention to the more subtle aspects of weaving it.

I use jugs with water as my beaming weight. I use water for a number of reasons, one of which is that it is very easy to add or subtract weight as required. I use a measuring cup and add 1 or 2 cups of water when a warp needs more weight, then empty one or two cups of water when a warp needs less weight. It depends.

The first mat warp I did I was re-learning all the things that needed to be done for this quality of warp and I didn't pay enough attention to the tiny signs that perhaps I should have used more tension while beaming. Frankly I've been a bit distracted while I work on other projects. These warps were just stash busting and testing to see if I could actually weave on the Leclerc without too much physical pain. So I was more focused on my body than what was happening on the loom.

The second warp I was beginning to have pain so I was again distracted by other things.

By this, the third warp things had settled down on the group/community building front, and I'd made the decision that I needed this warp to be the last one for now and I began paying attention to what was happening in the loom.

The first thing I noticed was that when I began weaving the warp, the tension kept getting looser. After a few picks it would loosen slightly and I would tighten it. A few picks later, same. This continued as I advanced the warp until I had woven about a yard/meter or so and then it seemed to settle.

Typically this happens when the brake is not holding and needs to be adjusted, but the Leclerc is pretty stable in that regard. Only if it continues do I begin to suspect the brake is the problem. However it *had* been a year since I'd woven on it so I wasn't about to diagnose a slipping brake. Yet.

This warp is designed to produce sturdy cloth, suitable for place mats. The weft is thick and needs to be beaten in quite firmly. Therefore the tension is kept tighter than for a tea towel or other qualities of cloth.

As I wove it, I paid more attention to advancing the fell and out of the corner of my eye (love peripheral vision!) I noticed that when one of the blinds I use for warp packing fell out and I then re-tensioned the warp, the first thing that happened was that a small amount of warp on the beam straightened out.

This is an indication that the warp was on the beam with a tiny bit of slack in it.

The next blind that came out I stopped and examined the beam before I re-set the tension and yup - slack on the beam.

Then I paid more attention to the web. That was when I noticed tiny fluctuations at the fell each time I advanced the warp. Within a few picks the fell would straighten out again.

If I had beamed with more tension/weight on the warp, if the warp didn't need such high tension in order to weave it, if it didn't need such a heavy beat, if the warp had been shorter, perhaps, these things might not have been happening.

So my general guideline is this - beam the warp with the same degree of tension as it will have in the weaving off. How do I know? That comes with experience. It depends on the warp packing that is used. It depends on the fibre. A yarn with less elasticity may well require much higher tension during beaming (looking at you linen!) than something with more elasticity.

A yarn with lots of elasticity will behave entirely differently from a yarn with little to none.

The type of loom may well make a difference. The Leclerc Fanny is counter balanced and as such opens the shed equally, up and down. A rising/jack type loom might behave quite differently because as tension on the warp is increased, some looms will respond by 'floating' the shafts. Some loom manufacturers provide ways to hold them down by using various means. Some looms have their shafts 'raked' such as the AVL. In other words, the rest position of the shafts descend towards the back. It's a complex equation that attempts to create as clean a shed as possible.

Other factors that might induce me to alter the tension during beaming is how tender the warp threads are. How wide the warp is. As mentioned previously, how much elasticity the yarn has. How textured the warp yarn is.

The signs that indicate more tension should maybe have been used are:

Tension slips during weaving and the brake itself is holding, not slipping.

The fell line isn't straight, but where it is crooked changes

The good news is that if the difference is slight, it might not be a big issue. For instance with this quality of cloth, I was just careful about advancing and re-tensioning. After wet finishing the cloth was perfectly fine.

All I can recommend is that when someone gets a new-to-them yarn they weave a small sample. Experience how the yarn is going to behave in the loom. Work out the processes that it needs to make it behave. And don't fuss too much at tiny inconsistencies. Many of those will work themselves out during wet finishing.

If you can't be perfect, be consistent.

On the book reading front I just finished reading Donna Leon's book Trace Elements and started Tana French's latest, The Searcher.