Still Not Perfect

 

The current series of warps are...complex.  

Today, after several days delay (due to physical maintenance and body protesting said maintenance) I finally started weaving the next warp.

I wasn't pleased with the beginning - sewing the hem would cut off part of the motif at the top and bottom, and I knew I wasn't going to be best pleased with that, visually.  But I thought I would complete the first towel, then change the treadling.

Until I got about 9" woven and spotted it.  Yup.  Threading mistake.

I had threaded 10-7 twice instead of 7-10 twice.  It wasn't really obvious while I was focused on other things - like making sure everything was working properly, fussing over the hems, etc., but once I spotted it, I couldn't *not* see it.

So, I cut it off, fixed the threading mistake and re-tied.  And, since I was starting over anyway, I edited the treadling sequence to create a 'proper' hem so that the motif would not be awkwardly chopped off.

And I thought about how several people over the years have told me that they can't wait until they get to the point where they don't make mistakes anymore.

Ha.  

Anyway, it's lunch time now, so I'm going to eat and then go back to the loom.  And this time I hope I don't find any more 'mistakes'...

Lessons Learned

 

Just finished weaving the lime green towels, and wanted to check a few things.

The first 5 towels on this warp were woven with a natural white cotton slub plyed with a 'natrual' (beige) linen yarn.  This yarn is quite textured, and I was essentially weaving natural on natural.  When I finished those yesterday, I set up to weave off the lime green in a similar but not quite the same treadling.

The lime green was smooth, not textured, and the colour was enough different that I could actually see the design.  And as I wove, my eye kept catching on an anomaly.  As I was nearing the end of the lime green I became quite certain there was a threading error where my eye kept snagging.

When I finished the green I rolled the cloth forward, dug into the heddles (of *course* the issue was in the last 8, not the front 8) and sure enough, I'd made a basic mistake.  Instead of threading 9, 10, 11, 12, I'd threaded 9, 10, 11, 13.  Then I had carried on by threading 12, 11, 10.  So I had a thread on 13 where it should not have been, then there were two threads on shaft 10 - because the next repeat started on 10.

Sigh.

OK tie a repair heddle in where it was needed on shaft 12, move the thread on 13 to 12.  Now I had two threads on 12 because I needed to move that progression down to 9 instead of ending on 10.

Tie another repair heddle where it was needed on 9, move the 'extra' thread from 12 down to where it was required on 9.

I could have cut off the warp at that point, but before I did that I needed to check the ppi for the next set of towels.  So I just tied yarn onto the threads I had to cut in order to move them, pinned them into the web, and rolled the cloth forward.  

Since the linen had almost zero draw in I had to weave at least an inch for the draw in to stabilize, then I used a contrasting colour (barely seen in the photo - rose thread) and laid a short length of it into the shed and wove 36 picks.  Eyeballing it I could see that 36 picks was longer than an inch, so I closed that group off by laying another bit of the rose thread into the shed and wove 30 picks.  Then I closed that section off by laying another bit of rose into the shed and finished with about 8 more picks.

By weaving some at the beginning and at the end, the picks are stabilized and you get a more accurate count.

I could adjust the tie up by removing some of the plain weave, but I kind of like how this is looking so far, so I'm going to go ahead and weave some towels with this set up - perhaps six?  Dunno.  Then I might change my tie up and weft colour and finish the rest of the warp.

However, I designed the treadling sequence for 36 ppi and since is is actually going to be 30, I need to edit the sequence and delete some of the picks so that my towels are a reasonable length.

Yes, I tend to make my towels larger than commercially made ones, but they shouldn't be so large they don't function all that well.  So, out comes the calculator as I re-do the math and work out how many picks I need for a towel, then adjust the treadling.

And yes, I anticipated this last bit and made my plans accordingly.  It was the threading error that I had *hoped* not to make, but oh well.  Still Not Perfect!

(And the threading error in the first 5 towels is invisible while I doubt the person who will be getting the lime green ones will care.  Since the threading error won't interfere with the function of the towels, I'm not fretting about it, especially when it was a fairly simple fix.)

Mastery

 

Yellow arrow shows where the mistake is

Pulling the thread out of the heddle from behind in order to thread into the proper heddle

Mastering a craft doesn't mean you don't make mistakes.

Mastering a craft is partly about recognizing when a mistake has been made, and knowing how to fix it.

Twill block motifs are good and all, but they do tend towards a sameness and I wanted a change so I messed around with a fancy twill for the current warp.

However, fancy twills are harder to thread than twill blocks and sure enough I had a brain cramp and made a mistake.  

The easiest way to find a threading error is to weave the cloth and then look for the mistake.

The error I made was subtle enough that I wove the entire first towel and still couldn't see the mistake.  So I left the loom for a few hours, then came back to take a closer look.  Much like finding a typo.

In the end I had to do a side by side comparison of the shapes woven into the cloth to finally *see* the error, which was about 160 threads from the left selvedge.  I had a choice to make.  Weave the entire warp with that error, hoping it wouldn't be noticeable after wet finishing, or take the time to re-thread those 160 ends.

With 20 yards or so of warp, I decided fixing it was worthwhile.  Then to work out how best to accomplish that.

Rejecting the first idea, for a number of reasons, I figured out what I'd done - or not done - finding my place in the threading draft so I could see where I went wrong in the sequence, then tied in the 'missing' 8 heddles.  Then, one by one, I moved the threads out of their incorrect place to their correct place.  In the bottom photo you might be able to see that my left hand is behind the heddles, pinching the thread between my index and middle finger.  My ring finger is lightly pressed against the target empty heddle and when I put the hook through that heddle and pull the thread through it, the thread comes out of the incorrect heddle from behind.

It took about an hour (the length of the U2 CD I was listening to) to tie the repair heddles and move the threads, one by one, to their proper place.  As I completed each group of threads, I marked them off on the paper copy of the draft, in a different colour from the first go through so that I could keep track of where I was in the rather lengthy threading repeat.

This morning I will resley the warp, tie on, and with any luck at all weave a towel this afternoon.  And hopefully I didn't make any other mistakes while I was correcting the first one!

Tracking

I'm always looking for ways to make things easier, simpler, efficient. 

Today I was threading a warp on 8 shafts - two blocks of twill, 40 ends per block.  Too many ends to easily see if I'd done enough - too little?  too many?  Counting out the groups of four to make sure I had 10 of them was taking time and annoying me.

After thinking about it for a few minutes I grabbed this little clip, counted out 10 heddles on shaft one (for block A) and proceeded to thread the four end repeat on shafts 1-4 until all 10 of the heddles on shaft 1 were used up.  Then I shoved all the heddles from the first four shafts to the left, counted out 10 heddles on shaft 5 and threaded the twill progression until those 10 heddles were used up.

I also tie each group of four into a slip knot, then tie the 10 groups of 4 into a larger slip knot, just so I can keep an eye on my progress - and make sure I alternate between the two sets of shafts.

Once I started doing this threading felt like it was going faster, but mostly I wasn't getting annoyed at having to repeatedly count out groups of four.  And peace of mind is a wonderful thing.

Oops...

There is a meme on Facebook that says that a master has failed more than the student has tried.

Photographic proof that I am batting 1000 in terms of making mistakes setting up the AVL!

Since I beam sectionally (most times) on the AVL, I rarely have precisely the number of ends that I need.  Quite often there are a few dangling off the back of the loom.  When I finished threading yesterday morning, however, there were rather more than I usually have so I was suspicious I'd made another threading error.

This time it was more annoying than just forgetting one end.  This time I'd left out eight!

Heaving a sigh, I started tying repair heddles on the shafts where they were needed, wound 8 pirns about half full and threaded them into the repair heddles.

Then under the sectional beam tension box rail and up over the rod in the ceiling (installed for just this purpose many moons ago) and left to hang down near the floor.

From the last warp I know I can't quite get two full towels without dropping the pirns to the floor again so that will be my routine for the 40 yards of this warp.  Weave a towel, drop the pirns, weave another towel, drop the pirns...

Currently reading A Slip of the Keyboard (collected non-fiction) by Terry Pratchett

Forest Part Deux

It took a bit of looking, but with the rest of the warp secure, I was able to pick through the repeat more easily than if all the threads were just 'loose' in the heddles.  By having them through the reed, there was less room for them to tangle and get out of sorts while I rooted through the threads...sure enough I'd missed a heddle on shaft nine which threw the entire sequence out of sync.  Here is where I've pushed the heddles to each side to free up the field of attack...

A quick tying of a repair heddle on shaft number nine and a 'spare' end inserted into the proper place.  The end will dangle off the back of the loom while I weave off the 30 yard warp.  Actually it will dangle off the rod in the ceiling, installed specifically for that purpose many moons ago, and which has since seen double duty as a warping valet.  After each two towels I will take a break, let down another couple of yards of yarn so that for my next session I'm all set to go.  At the same time I will take up the tube with the 'spare' ends - I'd wound a few extra ends just because it was easier than making that one section 'short'.  And besides, my narrow goods friend will be happy to take it off my hands so it won't go to waste.

And here it is, all sleyed, tied up and ready to go.  Since I'm weaving with a slubby cotton/linen yarn I'm not sure how many picks per inch the cloth will be until I weave a sample.  Then I'll set the auto cloth advance appropriately, generate the treadling for an entire towel and away I go.

After lunch!

Forest

700+ ends in 700+ heddles...and somewhere in the last 6 inches is a threading error.

Everything was going tickity-boo until the second half of the last full repeat when - instead of an even number of ends at the end of the repeat, I had an uneven number of ends.  So, somewhere in that forest of heddles, I made a mistake.

Now I could have rooted through all those heddles searching for it but instead I chose to continue to the end - I was nearly there, after all - and see if I could find it during sleying.  If I can't find it during sleying, I will tie on and start weaving which will pretty much pinpoint where the error is.

If it was a smaller repeat and fewer shafts, I would have taken the time to find it before finishing the threading stage, but I've been here before and frankly it is a royal pita to find a threading error when I don't know exactly where it is in a 180+ end repeat.  Far faster to just continue and - knowing that there is a mistake somewhere - be on the lookout for it in the following stages.

If I get to the point where I'm tied on and weaving, it is close enough to the edge that I don't mind - too much - having to deal with it at that stage.

With any luck at all it is as simple as two ends in a heddle.  The fix would be simple - just pull out the 'extra' end and let it dangle off the back beam.  With a 30 yard long warp, I wind any surplus ends onto a tube and just wind the yarn onto the tube as I weave.  These 'extra' ends are then donated to a friend who weave narrow goods.  She can make good use of a tube with 30 or so yards on it.

Oopsie

Sh*t, as they say, happens.  The benefit of experience is that you - generally - recognize it more quickly when it does and know how to best fix it.

I haven't used a 12 dent reed for a while and it's surprising how much finer it is than, say, 8.  I caught myself a few times loading a dent with either too many or two few ends, but obviously missed this one.  Until I started to tie on.

At first I thought I'd skipped a dent entirely, determined that it was closer to the right selvedge than the left, sighed and carried on tieing up.  Because it's easier to move everything over one dent if the part that doesn't need fixing is already secured.

Closer inspection revealed what had actually happened.  Two ends got caught and dragged into an adjacent space, so nothing actually needs to be fixed except the dent that has four instead of 2 and the space that is empty and needs two.

Whew!

#efficiencyfail

I knew I was tired.  I knew I was distracted.  I knew my mental faculties were less than sharp.  And once again I overestimated my capabilities!

Instead of marking off my draft as I completed each section, I relied on my dulled brain to follow the draft, so when I reached the end of the repeat, instead of having used up all of my ends as my math (always shaky at best) told me would happen, I was left with a whole bunch of threads left over.  

Oops.

too many ends

Giving myself the night off I went back to the studio first thing this morning and started setting up the loom to create a cross because my 'first' mistake was about 1/3 from the beginning.  Which meant I had to re-thread 2/3's of this warp.  (No, I couldn't fudge it - the mistake was such that re-threading was the only option.)

{I won't share my thoughts when I realized that!}

So I tied the warp up to the apron and prepared the computer to create a 2/2 cross when I discovered this - my actual first mistake...

It appears that when I transferred the draft from iWeaveit on my iPad to my big computer I didn't notice four 'extra' spaces in the middle of the draft.  Which means my math was all wrong right from the get-go...

Which means I'm going to have 'extra' ends left over.  But much better 'extra' than too few, right?

Inserting lease sticks and hanging them from the castle in preparation for re-threading took just a few moments with the warp still tied to the apron and therefore under tension...

If you look closely you can see a red line on the right hand side.  To the best I can determine, all of these threads are correct.  I will only pull out the rest of the warp, not this bit.

Fortunately I'm fast at threading so it won't take too long to get the warp correct.  As for the 'extra' ends - they will get wound onto a couple of cones as the weaving progresses as they roll off the beam.  They won't be 'wasted' as I will give them to a friend who is willing to salvage them for use in her weaving.

Am I happy about making such a silly mistake?  No.  Am I going to beat myself up about it?  No.  I'm just going to knuckle down and get it fixed.  Hopefully today after I do the pressing of the mats and samples for the Handwoven article I got run through the washer and dryer yesterday.

Distractions Galore

More distractions today, starting with a panicked phone call at 4 am from the other mother.  Poor Doug wound up having to deal with getting her situation sorted out as well as battling through with the work to be done on mom's house.  We should know tomorrow if the buyer will wait until the work is done or if the sale collapses.  But the work has to be done regardless, and the sooner the better.

In the midst of all this I managed to thread the small loom with a towel warp and started weaving.  I consider the first 6 inches to be loom waste/header so when I spotted the threading error I didn't fuss about it too much, just cut the offending ends...

...and pulled them out of the cloth.

There were only actually two ends that were wrong so I fixed those...

sleyed them through the reed and pinned them to the header.

Here is how it looks after weaving the hem and beginning the towel body.

first towel, hems (you should just be able to see the cut line woven in) and the beginning of towel #2

It took me a while to find the 2/16 beige cotton I wanted to use for the hems - the bin had gotten shuffled to the bottom of the pile in the store room.  I could have used natural white, but I really wanted to tone down the colours so that they would go more gracefully with the earthy tones I'm seeing for pottery/dinnerware in the shops.  While the white would have diluted the intensity of the colours, they still would have been quite 'pure'.  With the beige cotton slub and 2/16 cotton for hems, these towels should go quite nicely with the new design colours for interiors.

Mom was up walking today but it looks like they are going to keep her for an extra couple of days, which may mean that she won't come home until the 28th - the day I leave.  But frankly, I'd rather they kept her longer and made sure that everything is going well than send her home too soon!

Currently reading Restless in the Grave by Dana Stabenow

Math and Me

Math has never been my long suit - not even simple arithmetic.  Every once in a while I make a truly magnificent oopsie.  Weaving dishes up another serving of humbility pie!

Knowing that I'm not good at crunching numbers, I actually worked through the equation of how many ends I needed for this warp for the Big Project several times.  Seems like I simply repeated my mistake, several times, because I was short 16 ends.  I double checked my threading, using my system of grouping ends in their constituent repeats and confirmed that my threading was, indeed, correct.  I was really and truly short 16 ends.

Stopped and thought about it for a while.  This warp is, after all, for samples, right?  Could I live with the fact that one selvedge would be radically different from the other?

Much mulling produced the answer - no.

So I wound another warp chain of 16 ends, threaded it through the appropriate heddles, ran it around the back beam and up and over the warping valet.  Messed about with various weights until I got the right amount to provide sufficient tension and started weaving.

It's not a pretty sight, to be sure, but it's working - well enough. 

For curious minds, it took about 2 pounds of weight for the little chain.  And the really nice thing about the warping valet?  By running it over that, the yarn package is nice and close and the 'drop' is much longer than if I just weighted it off the back beam - no constantly running to the back of the loom checking to see if the weight needs to be dropped. 

I've got over a yard woven so far (the warp is 9 meters long).

Currently reading Raisins and Almonds by Kerry Greenwood

Lesson in Humbility

It doesn't do to get complacent - that's when you stop thinking.

This warp is 36 epi.  I have a 9 dent reed, but it's very old and rough on the top and bottom so when I checked my stored reeds I noticed that I also have a brand new metric reed (35) which is also 9 dents.  Without thinking too much I popped that reed into the beater and proceeded to sley it.  The entire time I was sleying it I did not once stop to ask myself why I hadn't been using this reed, but the old battered one.  Or if I did, I didn't take the time to properly answer the question.

Turns out that the reed is too 'short'.  When I put the beater top back onto the beater, there was a 1/2 inch gap between the reed and the top. 

Now, you may be asking yourself how it is possible for me to put the reed into the beater without putting the top of the beater on.  The answer is simple.  On the AVL, the bottom of the reed is 'pinched' between two pieces of wood.  And, since the beater top is rather large and blocks the view in order to sley, I leave it off while I do that job.

I really dislike having to change reeds and resley because all my nice neat little bouts which I so carefully tie into slip knots are now gone and the danger of making sleying errors is much, much greater when the warp ends are all loose. 

However since I was not resleying to change the density, merely changing one reed of the same dents per inch to another of the same dents per inch, I realized that instead of pulling the warp out of the wrong reed entirely, I could transfer each group dent by dent which would mean the risk of sleying errors would be low.

How to do this when the AVL doesn't really have side frames that the reed could lay on?  I grabbed a couple of short lease sticks (for the Leclerc Fanny or other smaller loom) and rested them on each side of the loom across the bottom of the shafts and onto the side frame of the loom.  And taped them there.  The reed rests quite comfortably there and it's only taking me a few minutes to pull each group in it's order and put it into the reed which is clamped in the beater. 

If you click on the photo you should be able to see the set up more clearly.

Once the reed is completely re-sleyed I'll carefully pull the reed out and remove the sticks and then I can go ahead and put the loom back together (the sandpaper beam is also out of the loom), tie on and ought to be weaving this afternoon.  :)

And I can be pretty sure there are no sleying errors to fix.  But just in case, I'll be sure to check each shed.  Doesn't do to get complacent!

Currently reading Snuff by (Sir) Terry Pratchett

Fixing A Threading Error

I started weaving on this Summer and Winter warp and only after messing about with the cloth advance for a while, cutting off, re-sleying and started weaving again did I realize that I'd had a brain cramp while threading and that 3 units were threaded onto the incorrect shaft.

When you have a threading error there are several different ways of fixing it.

In some cases the only way to fix a threading error is to cut off, remove the warp ends from the reed and heddle and re-thread from the error onwards.

In this instance since everything else is correct and the error is that the pattern ends are on the incorrect shaft, you can either cut the offending ends, tie in a repair heddle, thread the ends correctly and then deal with the cut ends, re-attaching them to the rest of the cloth.

OR, you can do as I do in this instance and tie a repair heddle so that the incorrect end is contained within the eye of the repair heddle and then cut out the incorrect heddle.



I begin by identifying the incorrect ends by marking them with a coloured thread.  By lifting the ends up, you can then mark the ends behind the reed like this:

Having a visual marker of where the incorrect ends are located means I don't have to go hunting for them as each one is corrected - in this case, 6 warps.

I generally have lots of 2/8 cotton around so I use a doubled length a different colour than my heddles or warp to make it easy to see what I'm doing.  Here I've looped the repair thread around the bottom of the shaft and tied a double knot at the same level as the bottom of the heddle eye and passed one side of the repair thread so that I can now tie the eye with the warp end travelling through the eye.  Like this:

New heddle eye tied with the warp thread passing through it.

Repair heddle tied on shaft three with the warp end now passing through the heddle on shaft four and three.

The incorrect heddle is then carefully cut out - top, bottom, and eye.  You can also do this if you have metal heddles but you'll need a pair of wire cutters to cut the metal.  Be careful cutting the heddle eye to release the warp end, carefully bending the eye open so you can release the warp from the metal eye without snagging the thread and damaging it.

A matter of moments and a few cents worth of heddles and voila, you're weaving again!

Currently reading A Murderous Procession by Ariana Franklin