I am a NEWBY weaver. Can anyone direct me to a video showing how to measure and warp a floor loom with 2 or more colors? I have gotten a lot of information from Illuminations but I can't find a video that shows how to use 2 or more colors for your warp. Ann

Comments

Mon, 10/14/2013 - 15:35

endorph

you wanting to use the two or more colors - are you doing stripes, shadow weave, etc.?
Mon, 10/14/2013 - 20:41

mrdubyah (not verified)

Try the Youtube series by Elizabeth Wagner at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aojxmo81XxU  (measuring)

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Aa2l50JEWE (winding 1 of 3)

Wed, 10/16/2013 - 20:34

CircleSquare

I have looked at a number of Wagner videos and they are very informative, but I find it very confusing to know which video is next. For a complete newby, which comes first - threading the heddles, winding a warp, or sleying a reed? It's like Greek! I have figured out a lot of it already. But she does not say anything about using 2 or more colors to make a striped warp.I know . . . I should start with one color . . . but I am looking ahead!!

Wed, 10/16/2013 - 20:32

CircleSquare

I want to know how to use 2 or more colors of warp to make stripes. Do you put, say, 10 wraps of brown on the warping board, then change to black, put 10 wraps of black on the warping board, then switch back to the brown? Or do you measure all the brown first, take it off the warping board, then measure all the black. . . ??

Wed, 10/16/2013 - 21:14

ReedGuy

How many cones or spools of each color do you have? If you have, say 4 each, you can hold 4 ends of yarn in your hand between your fingers. For wide warps this is important for speeding things up. If twelve ends for instance are required of each stripe color, you make 3 passed on the board. Then switch colors, and continue on the warping board. You understand the idea of the cross, and understand using a measure string to set up the path for the length of the warp ends required?

I find drawings are better than pictures or videos because the captions depict the subject and leave out the background 'noise'. You take a picture of a loom with everything there, and no labeling, what is a beam, a shaft, or a lamm? Some can confuse a beam for the roller, especially when both are pictured and no mention of the other. ;)

Wed, 10/16/2013 - 21:42

laurafry

If you want stripes,  simply wind the number of ends you want of each colour in their sequence.

I, too, have clips on You Tube.  They are not in order - unfortunately that is not the way You Tube works  :(  However there *are* dvd's available for sale (if you learn better through watching someone do the different things needed to be done) and no doubt there will be more in the future (which doesn't help you now!)  However, if you can find some books that will walk you through the process in order and watch the video clips (which ever ones you prefer) I'm sure it will begin to make sense.

cheers,

Laura  You Tube user name lauraannfry1

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 02:05

celtinbirks

Is there any video anywhere on measuring stripes on a warping mill?             Thanks

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 02:56

pammersw

You decide how wide you want the stripes, say 2 inches. Then you figure out how many warp threads per inch you will have. 12 or 18 are typical numbers.  This is called "ends per inch" or epi. Then do the math. 12 x 2 is 24 warp strands in each color. The length is the length of the finished item plus about 18 inches for loom waste.

For your example with my figures, you would do the path till you have the 24 strands of brown,  then break the yarn and tie on the black. Wind on 24 strands of black, then break it and switch back to brown. It is faster if you have more than one ball of each color because you can do 2 or 3 strands of each color at a time, which makes measuring the warp go faster.

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 03:47

laurafry

For stripes on a mill, the easiest way to do it is to break or cut the yarn when you have finished one colour, tie the next colour on, wind all the ends you need with that, break or cut, etc.

cheers,

Laura

Thu, 10/17/2013 - 08:36

ReedGuy

Also, if there are odd number of passes, saying if you end on pass three, tie back on that turn dowel, because it can through off your rhythm with the cross. In other words, if your cross is 4 threads each, you could end up with 8, not that that makes a difference in the cloth produced, but as you thread heddles and the reed you will group threads, and helps focus on the width of the piece. I like to keep some order to warping and threading. Hate chaos. :D

Sat, 10/19/2013 - 01:47

sally orgren

Yes, I can see if you are viewing videos out of context, it can be confusing!

I would suggest the book "Warping by Yourself" by Cay Garrett as a loom-side reference with illustrations to help you with warping.

You might be confused by what you see because there are two ways to dress a loom. One method beams the warp, then threads the loom. The other method threads the loom, then beams the warp once threaded.

Given your stripe challenge, front-to-back (F2B) warpers might be likely to wind all the color 1 warp, and take those bouts to the front of the loom. Then they would wind all the color 2 warp and take those bouts to the front of loom and overlay with the first group. Next, they sley the reed to spread out the warp to the desired width, and then thread heddles. They might sit at the back of their loom to do this, and look at their draft upside down to thread the loom. With this process, they could select the color they want to make the stripe the width they want, as they sley and then thread. The last step is to beam their warp.

Back-to-front (B2F) warpers would wind each stripe on the warping board, say 20 blacks, followed by 20 browns, 20 blacks, etc. When they take their bouts to the loom, they will use a raddle to spread the warp to the desired width, and beam the warp first. Then, typically sitting at the front of their loom, they will thread the heddles next, and the reed last.

My preference is to wind the warp exactly the way I want it, not overlay the bouts to "design" as I am threading. 

As for one method being faster than another, I think there are time trade-offs at different steps of each process. If someone is highly practiced with either method, they will be fast. However, at Convergence 2012 Madeyln and Suzie Liles had a face off. Madelyn is a F2B warper and Suzie is B2F. Both put on very fast warps, but Suzie won by several minutes. (I don't know what other variables were involved, like if they were doing the same threading, fiber, and length/width of warp).

Sun, 10/27/2013 - 23:06

suem

Alice Schlein has a very good article on warping 4 end stripes by hand.  See Weavers 34 p. 54-57.

Mon, 10/28/2013 - 01:22

lalaloom

FYI, if you want to view the videos in order on YouTube, you can. All you need to do is go to the page channel (in this case: http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCj0wpxThW_FDx88Pe5C9m0w) and then underneath the name you see a house & beside that it says, "Videos"
Click on that & then click where it says, "Date Added" and change it from oldest to newest. It will put the videos in the order they were uploaded, most likely (but not always) the order in which they were filmed. I believe for the Wagner series, it puts them into the proper order for viewing.

Hope that helps!

Lori

Mon, 10/28/2013 - 02:06

janenedriscoll

If you are new to weaving, you might want to get a copy of Debra Chandler's book :Learning to Weave, Revised Edition [Hardcover] Deborah Chandler (Author) Your local library or weaving guild might have a copy. I. Taught myself to weave with her book and even after almost 20 years of weaving, I can't imagine not having her book on my shelf for reference. She describes with pictures and text every step of weaving,warping both front to back and back to front. She shows how to weave stripes too! Janene
Sun, 03/20/2016 - 21:56

Mabe

Hi, all -- I'm new to Weavolution, though not to weaving, and realize I'm picking up an old thread here, so don't know if anyone is still paying attention.

Generally I prefer to wind warp on a horizontal mill -- among other things, it's a lot easier on my back, as there is no bending or changing height. But, as LauraFry pointed out above, if the warp is multicolored, you have to cut and tie off each stripe, which gets pretty tedious with a warp with lots of thin stripes and borders between colors. If someone has another way to do it, please post.

So, if you are doing a warp where color stripes repeat, this seems to me one area where the warping board is preferable to the mill -- with the board, you just set aside the cone at the end of the stripe and go on with the next one, then pick up the yarn from the first cone when it is time to repeat. You do get a minor bit of tangling at the end this way, but it's so close to the cross that it combs out pretty easily.

Is this your experience, or am I missing something?

Thanks,

Matt