Sectional Beaming

Both the Macomber (BigMac) and the 'restored' loom (PT) have sectional warp beams. BigMac is 2" and PT 1.5".  Up until now I have never used them for the purpose they were designed - rather I have warped them traditionally back to front or front to back, but just tied on to the beam and wound on as the entire width of warp ends.  This has led to some almighty tangling, despite warping under tension and a slow/careful pace.  I decided I needed a spool rack and with it try beaming through a tension box direct to the warp beam (in 2" sections as this is on BigMac).

The first consideration was: how many spools?  Turns out this placemat project with linen at 24 epi would mean I need 48 spools - seemed like a logical start as the only higher epi count would be for something like a kilt which has other considerations and is way in the future (time to build a side rack with another 12 spools or so by then).

I was able to buy all the wood/supplies I needed in Cleveland and the rack itself was a relatively easy frame with some center supports.  I was worried that the holes for the axles wouldn't line up - I measured more than three times.  No need to worry though - the brass rods slipped through from side to side.  I glued and nailed it together and will in slower time fill the gaps and stain/varnish the whole thing.  There are several future modifications to make, but at this stage it was ready for the spools.

The frame prior to glue/nails (testing that the brass rods fitted)

I don't have a drill press (I must get one soon) so to drill out the spool centers from the wooden dowel I had to manufacture a jig for the electric drill to allow repeatable drilling through the center of each dowel.  Managed to get that all working and then made short work of drilling them out.  The next step was to glue and nail each cardboard end - another assembly line job quickly accomplished.  Once dry I was ready to wind some spools.

Drilling center holes

Spool ends (from beer coasters)

I made the center hole the same size as my shuttle bobbins so that I could use the hand winder.  I did have to take into account the spool was way wider than a typical bobbin so ended up mounting the whole set-up on the side of one of our kitchen stools - it included the bobbin winder and a yarn measuring device so that I could tell how much yarn went on to each bobbin - for this project 150 feet each.

Spool winder

With the spools wound and fitted to the rack it was time to take the individual threads through the front and back combs of the tension box, a Nilus Leclerc No.409 I bought second had some years back, then after adjusting the tension and attaching the bundle to the warp beam it was a simple matter to wind 11 turns of the beam (it's approximately 3/4 of a yard), then move it all over to the next section.  The project is only 12 inches wide so only needed 6 sections wound.  Each section is finished by applying some masking tape and then cutting the ends.

Winding on

Each section taped and cut.

The next part of dressing the loom is to thread the heddles and sley the reed.  The tape from the winding out turned out to be a real blessing as it could be attached to a temporary beam immediately behind the castle  so that with a simple reach and peel off of the 'next' thread it could be passed through the appropriate heddle and then straight away sleyed through the reed which I had conveniently place right in front of the heddle frames.

Warp ends ready to sley into heddles (taken from left)

This process took no more than a couple of hours to complete and I'm sure it was way longer when taking each warp end from a cross behind the castle.

With it all tied up it was a quick start to weave on the first couple of inches where I've stopped while the dye  for the weft stripes sets.