Project:Loom

Artag's Harris 8-shaft table loom

This project will mostly be done away from the hackspace as I don't want to use a large amount of space. I'm interested in working with other people on it too though - I can bring the loom to the hackspace if you have a weaving project you'd like to do, or there may bits of hardware to make that can be assembled and tested at the space before being added to the loom. There are also some accessories that may be built at the space. I welcome any ideas or expertise, especially from experienced or less-experienced weavers.

First job is to make some fabric. I want to produce a scarf with wires woven into it to form touch-sensitive pads.

Then there are a number of 'improvements' I want to make :

Andrew at Edinburgh Hacklab has started a project to build an electronic Dobby loom. A Dobby loom is roughly the same setup as this one but has automatic, programmable shuffling of the heddle frames, thereby speeding and helping with the patterning. I'd like to help the project along by doing some similar work on the table loom.

A Kickstarter project (Osloom) was set up to build an open-source Jacquard loom. This seems to be stuck, but I have some ideas of my own that I'd like to try, concentrating particularly on the idea of a jacquard head that might be made more cheaply - albeit with some restrictions - than the usual massively parallel ones.

This isn't the actual loom, it's one like it. Mine has two warp beams and is 32 inches wide (80 cm).

Progress

13.12.11

Derusted and polished 4 of the shafts
Cleaned and adjusted the heddles - this is a temporary measure, they'll probably need replacing at some point.

11.12.11

Replaced cruddy bolts holding beater, now running in brass bushes instead of directly in the wooden arms. 
Replaced frayed cords controlling warp beam release mechanism
Reassembled castle

9.12.11

Removed light rust and polished shaft-lifting levers etc. 

5.12.11

Installed in loft, required taking it mostly apart to fit through the hatch. All held together with woodscrews so not difficult.