I recently restored a counterbalance loom and tested it with a goose-eye pattern using four shafts and horses. I would add a photo if I could figure out how. This site isn't very intuitive. I am now ready to try a wider project and up to 10 shafts. I am looking for ideas for suitable patterns for this type of loom. I own the 8-shaft Strickler book, and can get drafts from hand weaving.net. I think I understand a balanced tie-up, but wondered how a multi-shaft design that required a tabby is handled. When I weave a design with alternating tabby and pattern on my jack looms and 4-shaft counterbalance and countermarche looms, I set up my treadles so I can use one foot for the tabby and the other for the pattern. Is weaving with tabby possible on the multi-shaft counterbalance and how would I do so? Jenny Bellairs in Charlevoix the Beautiful, Michigan, USA

Comments

Sat, 09/03/2016 - 08:56

kerstinfroberg

Traditionally, we Swedes dit not "use tabby" for multi-shaft weaves: we wove "dräll" (turned twill, turned satin) instead. (Which, incidentally, explains why Swe looms with >4 shafts seldom have two extra treadles...)

However: IF your threading follows the odde-even rule, a "trad" tabby tieup (on treadle all odds, next treadle all evens) will work.

The ONLY rule for dräll pulleys: what goes down om one side of the pulley MUST come up on the other side - all tieups must be "on opposites".

Like so:

4 shafts on drall pulley

(Read more on my website, here)

Sat, 09/03/2016 - 14:41

Joanne Hall

And do you have the drall pulleys that Kerstin shows in her diagram?

Joanne

Sat, 09/03/2016 - 17:12

jennybellairs

Joanne, I do have the drall pulleys that Kerstin shows.

I have tried for over half and hour to try and figure out how to add a photo that isn't twisted sideways.  I give up!

10-shaft counterbalance set up as 4 shaft test warp

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 00:29

Sara von Tresckow

Kerstin has provided excellent diagrams for how to use the damask pulleys. If you wish to do some of the drafts in Strickler that are not so balanced as turned twill or block damask, you'll need to use horses and pulleys as shown in something like "Big Book of Weaving", as well as for things that have a tabby in them. The key to setting up your loom will be a good understanding of how the draft you are using translates into actual fabric. Some things on handweaving.net will work, others will need the pulley/horse combination.

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 04:29

jennybellairs

Thanks Sara. I looked through a lot of posts in Kerstin's blog and she had a five shaft draft posted so I will try that next. I think I will get the most understanding of my loom if I just work through some different projects, adding a shaft or two each time. 

The Big Book has been quite helpful, but I have run across a couple things in it that weren't clear to me. When I get to the stage of needing to understand them, I will probably ask more questions. 

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 10:11

kerstinfroberg

if you mean a draft for five shafts total, it will not work.

Why? because every shaft has to have a "partner" on the other side of its pulley... thus, six shafts will work - or two, four, eight, ten.

(If you mean the "tablecloth for christmas"-post, it is a five *block* draft, thus minimum 15 shafts if woven with w 1/2 versus 2/1 twill)

 

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 12:09

jennybellairs

Thanks Kerstin for clarifying about five shafts. I will have to re-look at that pattern. I missed about it being blocks.

I thought The Big Book of Weaving showed how to tie up five shafts and  assumed it was something I could use to try that configuration. I will look at the book again also.

I appreciate all the help. 

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 12:59

Joanne Hall

Hi Jenny,

Yes, the Big Book shows the tie-up of five shafts.  I did this once just to try it and I wove a 5 shaft weave.  Yes, it can be done.  But, it takes a lot of care to do it to get the sheds right.  

Joanne

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 13:04

Joanne Hall

Back in the 90s I purchased an old immigrant made loom in Minnesota for an Art Center where I was teaching.  The loom was over 100 years old and it came with a special pulley constructed for tying up odd numbers of shafts.  I had already tied up 5 shafts, so I recognized it.  But it made me wonder if weaving satin was important to the Swedish immigrants to Minnesota.  I had done some research at the Historical Society there and there is very little information about what immigrant weavers wove in the 1800s.

Joanne

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 16:53

Sara von Tresckow

The tieups in "Big Book" are written for normal pulleys and horses. They DO NOT APPLY to your 10-shaft damask pulleys. They are two separate ways to tie up your counterbalanced loom. The damask pulleys only work when you have an even number of shafts in play and every pick depends on the same number of shafts rising as shafts sinking. Every other tieup will require "normal" parts.

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 21:35

jennybellairs

I realize it takes a different type of pulley. Since I am using just one pulley in my drall pulleys to tie up four shafts, I figured I could use the dralls  if I wanted to try the three shaft connection (pg 217), or use it and add an additional pulley with the horses to each to do the five shaft (pg 218). Joanne says it can be done, but perhaps it is beyond what I care to try at this point. 

I don't have the special pulleys and extra horses for hanging six or eight shafts (pgs 218-219), so I guess it is time for me to try ten, or possibly a balanced eight with the drall pulleys.

Perhaps I will get my husband Bob to help me make those special pulleys and horses sometime. They don't look hard as long as I have approximate dimensions and know where they need to pivot. 

I have been analyzing tie-ups in Strickler's 8-shaft pattern book, looking for ones that are balanced. I am assuming I could use the drall pulleys for these. Please point out why if I am wrong. I have found these so far: 

17, 39, 47, 48, 49, 58-75, 225-228, 245-248. 

Sun, 09/04/2016 - 23:09

jennybellairs

This is another take on #47, from my online friend Susan Harvey. Link to her blog post:

http://weeverwoman.blogspot.com/2015/07/17-years-and-10-days.html

Mon, 09/05/2016 - 15:21

Sara von Tresckow

Lets not make a big issue of the "special" pulleys and horses - we carry what you'd need as does Glimakra and probably Webs. They are not expensive. Your damask pulleys are so long that they will get in the way of any "normal" 6 or 8 shaft tieup you might be using, not that they wouldn't work in theory.

Mon, 09/05/2016 - 22:24

jennybellairs

Sara, would an 8 shaft pattern like #47 in Strickler's book work with the drall pulleys? I am assuming it would work if I can do a balanced 10 shaft pattern with them. 

I haven't found a balanced 10 shaft pattern yet

 

Tue, 09/06/2016 - 07:26

kerstinfroberg

in all haste - what is an "opposite" tieup?

It is one where each shaft travels "opposite" its partner shaft - as each shaft has one partner (when using dräll pulleys, see above). This also means the tieup must be "even" (half of the shafts are up, half down for each shed).

Sometimes it is possible to convert a tieup so that it works with dräll pulleys. This always involves changing the  threading.

One simple example - a 2/2 twill. Traditionally it is threaded straight, with a tieup like this:

The red line marks the positin of the pulleys. Starting from the left, the first column will work. The second will not, as shafts 1 and 4 both go up (in the Swe notation), while shafts 2 and 3 both go down). Third column is "opposite", fourth is not.

So what can be done? We need to do something to both column 2 and 4, trying to get them "opposite". One way is this:

By changing the threading, we have also changed the tieup, which is now compatible with the dräll pulleys: it is now "opposite".

I will try to expand on this later, but today is a very busy day :-)

(I don't have Strickler, but, as of above, all dräll pulley tieups have to be "even". For me, the Swe word "dräll pulleys" indicates they were invented for weaving dräll, which always means a block weave...)

 

Wed, 09/07/2016 - 15:38

kerstinfroberg

Now I have experimented... but tired before I had got a "good" result.

My conclusion is that dräll pulleys have got their name 'cos they were invented to facilitate 2-block dräll, and therefore do not quite work for other structures.

It resulted in a blog post, though!

(And Jenny: now that I have followed your link to Susan Harvey - yes, it will work. And... it can be considered a 2-block opposite structure, IMO.

Maybe it can work with a doubled block size, too?)

Wed, 09/07/2016 - 17:50

jennybellairs

i think I may have been misunderstanding balanced tie-up. I thought the tie-up box needed to be divided into quarters, and each quarter, both side to side and top to bottom needed to be balanced. Is it only top and bottom?

Thu, 09/08/2016 - 06:47

kerstinfroberg

Yes, only top to bottom.

The quartering comes from the 2-block dräll.

Thu, 09/08/2016 - 11:28

jennybellairs

Thank you. That is helpful. Now to find some drafts. My chemo brain just isn't up to figuring new stuff out by myself.