Small, but Stubborn

Before I laid actual eyes on her, I knew from contacting Macomber with her model and serial numbers she was made in 1960 and sold to a textile factory in New York City. They also said she had originally been stained walnut, something they no longer did.

When we brought the little 24” Macomber home, I was impressed with how tiny she was when compared to the other two Macomber looms in residence. Despite her diminutive size, she seemed every bit as sturdy and solid.

A closer inspection revealed that unlike other looms of her relative age, she had a lamm depressor, instead of a wooden dowel tied to the lamm box with a cotton rope, and she had eight harnesses from the beginning.

The walnut stain, lamm depressor, and a full eight harnesses convinced me she was a top of the line model in her day, as those items were upgrades and more expensive.

While I do not habitually personify and name inanimate objects, each of the looms has been named.

The Beast at over 400 pounds required four men to carry into the house and came by his appellation honestly. He was simply a beast.

When the second floor loom arrived, a 36” Leclerc, she became known as Belle with a nod toward Disney. (In her new home, she has acquired the moniker of Claire, which suits her perfectly.)

She was replaced by a 32” Macomber who initially did not have a name, but she did sport a name plate in the middle of her castle, a holdover from her university days.

She was named quite accidentally as I was cleaning her up and taking inventory of what parts she needed. I do admit to talking to myself, as well as to things. The conversation was something along the lines of “Okay, Lil Miss, what do you think about a pair of new aprons and four more harnesses...”

Lil Miss Macomber had a ring to it, and it stuck, at least the Lil Miss part.

Now “Meg” just popped into my head as I thinking about the smallest loom.

I liked it, and it seemed appropriate.

I had no idea the meaning behind it, but I now see that Meg is the pet form of Meghan, which is a cognate of Margaret meaning pearl.

As I spent four years searching for a 24” 8-shaft Macomber, I can attest she is certainly a pearl, which is defined as a person or thing of great rarity and worth.

Obviously, I enjoy words.

I guess I should also mention according to the Urban Dictionary, Meghan also means “A crazy, obsessive and psychotic girl that seems really sweet and innocent until you really get to know her. She will ruin your life for eternity while claiming she misses you.”

I am totally going with the traditional meaning of Meg, by the way, but in recent weeks I had serious doubts.

As discussed in the previous post, Meg and I have not been getting along. We have been skipping threads consistently, which produced substandard weaving.

We gave her new chains and hooks from which her freshly painted harnesses hung. We replaced her aprons and completely cleaned her up. She received new beater pads and a heel rest with proper casings to hold it securely. She was thoroughly cleaned and polished.

However, she has proven to be a stubborn and stalwart foe.

No matter the tweaks or adjustments I made, we continued to skip threads.

I found this completely frustrating and disappointing.

Whenever I came up with a thought on how further to address the problem, I would execute it, weave for a bit, discover more skipped threads, and abandon her for the other looms while I ground on what next could be done.

New rods which will attach the jacks to the lamms are on order to replace her badly bent and misshapen ones, although, there is uncertainty regarding their arrival.

Sunday evening, I finally decided to try again. This time I took my time and wove consciously and deliberating, paying close attention to my every move to discover how and when the skipped threads occurred.

The distance between the reed and the breast beam is twelve inches.

The cloth must extend at least two inches in front of the beam or the race on the beater will strike breast beam.

I learned that the skips were happening when I was within five to six inches of the reed. While I had a clean shed, the closer the cloth moved to the beater, the warp threads began to rise above the race. The skipped threads were created when the tip of the shuttle dipped and caught bottom threads.

To compensate for this, I eased off the warp tension the closer to the reed I got and I advanced the cloth more often.

The good news is that I was able to weave two yards without any noticeable skipped threads, at least from the top of the fabric. I am a bit concerned there may be some underneath, but I will not know until I take the cloth off the loom.

The not so good news is that I must advance the cloth every four inches or so.

By way of comparison, the Beast has fourteen inches between the breast beam and reed, eight-and-a-half to nine inches of which are cable of being woven.

Likewise, on Lil Miss, I have thirteen inches of which seven-and-a-half to eight inches are weavable.

I also learned that I am not a ratchet brake fan.

Honestly, I already knew this, but I thought I could live with the ratchet on her plain beam because I have a sectional beam on order for her with a friction brake.

However, advancing the cloth beam every four or so inches in practice is having to deal with that ratchet brake every few minutes.

I cannot live with the ratchet brake. Period.

I sent Linda at Macomber an email last night asking her to add a friction drum to my order for the plain beam already on the loom, as well as the necessary hardware to make it work in unison with the friction brake on the sectional beam, which will be coming.

Despite her diminutive size, Meg is quite the challenge. She will only be used according to her terms.

I anticipate replacing the bent rods will help with the weaving overall, but Meg and I still have a lot to learn about one another.

Plus, this is only the second warp I have had on her.

Laura Fry is a weaver, teacher, and author. (There is an excellent review of her book here.) I recently stumbled upon her blog Weaving a Life. She is in the throes of shutting down a forty-year career/business in weaving by the end of the year. As production weaving will soon be behind her, she bought a new loom, a Louet Megado, which, apparently, is very different from the AVL on which she wove for decades.

She posted the other day about Seven Warps.

She said: "I share with students that when I learn a new technique/process, I give myself seven warps to learn it so that it becomes my new default. 

Becoming friends with the Megado is going to also take several warps, maybe that entire seven, before I tweak my processes so that we can work together well."

Seven warps sounds right.

Despite our differences, I firmly believe by the end of that seventh warp, Meg and I will be humming along beautifully!