The 30-dent reed arrived yesterday (yay!!), so it’s time to start work on the sample again. I got it beamed on and nicely draped from the lease sticks yesterday, so today will be all about threading. I haven’t yet solved the problem of what to use as a sleying hook, given that the reed is so fine, but I’m thinking some kind of (suitably bent-into-shape) piano wire might be in order. So now the problem becomes finding piano wire, or some other sort of stiff, fine wire. Fortunately it will take me a day or two to thread all 1000 threads, so I have some time to figure out where to find a musician’s store or obscure hobby shop.
The web redesign is proceeding nicely; I added more content and changed s0me of the colors yesterday. The background is now a very pale purple, and the menu is purple with orange text. The purple and orange were both taken out of the header image, so harmonize nicely with the header image. I also added three or four projects, a time-consuming process since I have to upload a photo gallery for each project. I have gallery software that allows me to upload the photos all at once, but I still have to enter captions, alt text, and descriptions for each photo. But the end results look very nice, if I do say so myself. 🙂
Cynthia asked how much tomato soup the recipe makes. It’s about 2 gallons, give or take; I’m a lazy cook and like getting a lot of soup for my efforts. It freezes very nicely.
Hi Tien,
One thing you might want to try is lay the reed flat and *push* the threads through using a thin plastic ‘card’. Might be easier than trying to pull the mouse hair through with a hook?
Cheers,
Laura
What about one of those punch needle threaders that they have at the craft store? they are about 5″ long and have a piece of white label holding the two ends together to form the loop. I think they are only a couple of bucks.
One of the best weaving tools ever made for me was from piano wire. Used in rug weaving to pull the loose weft ends tightly up through the woven web, it is very similar to previously described dental threaders. The piano wire is crimped on three sides to make a elongated diamond effect, and then both ends soldered onto a brass handle. But bent piano wire would work in a pinch. Even the plastic dental threaders would work.
–Sue in MA
I was trained as an industry sample weaver. We put two 1×2 sticks from the front beam to the back. Laid the reed flat on this. We then measured the length of the reed, subtracted the width of the item to be woven., divide this number in half. This amount is measured from the end of the reed on the right, this is your starting point.
The threads are gathered in your left hand between your fingers (think claw, palm down), firm tension. Then you count off the number of heddles/threads, close to the heddle. Follow with your hook down the threads and push the threads down through the reed opening. Do several, then make sure the threads are through to the back of the reed. We wove between 50-80 epi.
Teresa
I just sleyed one of these 120/10 reeds not too long ago and I used a regular white plastic sley hook. Although the dents are so close together that you have to sley more by feel than by looking, they push apart with the hook and come back together just fine- especially in the swedish reeds. Just check and double check- you don’t want to make any sleying errors. I also sley with the reed laid flat. It makes ALL the difference in the world.
Also, to decrease broken threads, on the first beat, bring the beater into the fell line and then don’t release. Make sure that you are holding the beater at the fell line when you change the shed and then beat on the new shed to clear your shed and to set the thread. This diminishes the abrasion on the threads as they pass by each other and helps to prevent breaking. Weave only 1/2 inch at a time before advancing the temple and only 1 inch at a time before advancing the warp. Finally , be as careful as possible with warping. Even tension in winding and beaming the warp goes a long way to diminishing broken threads in the weaving.
Sorry about the lecture. I hope this helps.
Kate