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You are here: Home / All blog posts / Weaving complications
Previous post: Resources for handwoven fabric design
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January 7, 2016 by Tien Chiu

Weaving complications

The last few days have been an exercise in frustration.

I started weaving the second phoenix yesterday. A few inches into it, I realized that some threads were not lifting as they should…which meant something was wrong. I tried gently loosening the pistons on the errant threads, but then others started sticking. After some diagnostic work, I realized that the problem wasn’t with the loom, but the environment. The TC-2 is designed to work within a temperature range of 62-82 F and a relative humidity of 30-65%. I was trying to weave at too low a temperature and too high a humidity. So the bores were contracting and the pistons (I think) expanding, resulting in stuck pistons.

I solved this problem by cranking up the dehumidifier, turning on the space heater, and giving things a couple of hours to settle. Magic! No more sticking.

Almost immediately, however, I ran into some ergonomic issues. Apparently my body does not like having to press the TC-2 foot pedal repeatedly, either standing or sitting. As a result, I’ve been battling hip bursitis for the last few months. After about a hundred picks, the bursitis flared up and I had to stop. Clearly, this had to be fixed.

So, at Mike’s urging, I attached the foot pedal to the castle of the TC-2, where I could trigger the next pick/lift by hand before beating the next pick. This solved the problem, and I wove almost eight inches successfully. Hooray!

But then I noticed something ominous. The bottom of the piece looked vertically stretched. I pulled out the finished phoenix to compare, and confirmed that the vase was far longer than it should be, even taking shrinkage into account. I started cursing, because I knew exactly what had happened. Moving the pedal to the castle had changed my weaving rhythm. Because I was triggering the new position by hand, I was bringing the beater forward (to place each thread in place) at a different point in the open/close rhythm of the lifting threads. That was enough to change my pick density (number of threads per inch), which elongated the weaving.

This would not be a major problem – the phoenix might be a little stretched, but not too badly – except that I had rashly included a moon in the piece. The moon, as everyone knows, is a sphere, so an ovoid moon would look distinctly out of place. So there is nothing for it except to weave another sample, correct the aspect ratio, and start over. Hopefully I will have enough yarn to finish the reworked version!

Fortunately, all is not frustration. I had some fun as well, doodling up a set of cat napkins to match the cat placemats. In addition to conveniently offering each diner a cat demanding to be fed, the napkins are designed so that, when folded into quarters, each quarter contains a cat or a cat yin-yang. The plan is for a set of 22×22″ napkins, a generous size for any spills. (The colors will change when I actually weave the napkins – probably burgundy or cranberry against black.)

cat napkins!
cat napkins!

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Filed Under: All blog posts, textiles, weaving Tagged With: cat placemats

Previous post: Resources for handwoven fabric design
Next post: The subtleties of weaving

Comments

  1. loomtalk says

    January 7, 2016 at 10:40 am

    So frustrating when our “machines” aren’t operating perfectly. Usually human problems.
    Love the paw prints on the napkins, they bring the design together.

  2. Sheila O'Hara says

    January 8, 2016 at 7:51 am

    Dear Tien,
    Glad you were able to solve the sticking hooks problem. When I rented time on Nina Jacobs TC-1 from 2000 to 2006 – I knew that when it was cold we had the same problem. A space heater helped us out, too. Also happy to read that you can move the foot pedal to avoid hip irritation and that changing the pick count in Arahweave is easy. I do hope you have enough yarn left. Your brother will love it.
    Happy weaving!
    Sheila O’Hara
    http://www.sheilaohara.com

  3. dave w says

    January 28, 2016 at 8:06 pm

    Yeah, low temp would contract the aluminum, and many plastics (such as nylon IIRC – which is what the pistons seem to be) swell a bit in moist conditions. (I wonder if it makes sense to rig a bypass line from the air pump exhaust for a “cold weather” mode – instead of blowing all that nice warm air out the back of the garage, open a flap valve on a T fitting between the pump output port and the muffler, and duct some of it into the module area of the loom…)

  4. dave w says

    January 28, 2016 at 8:10 pm

    Also – I love the yin-yang cat design! 🙂

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