With a standard treadle loom, we tie the treadles to the shafts we want lifted to create the pattern. One treadle can control multiple shafts, so I only need to know which treadle to push. With a direct tie-up loom, each shaft is tied to its own lever. So, we lift as many levers as are required to create the pattern.
The shafts on my table loom are permanently tied up thus . . .
I need to rewrite the tie-up and treadling as a liftplan. From the tie-up I note that:
treadle 1 lifts shafts 1 & 2treadle 2 lifts shafts 2 & 3treadle 3 lifts shafts 3 & 4treadle 4 lifts shafts 1 & 4
My task is to show which levers to lift for each pick. Where the treadling shows treadle 1, I replace it with levers 1 and 2, treadle 2 is changed to levers 2 and 3, etc. When I'm done, it looks like this
I can omit the tie-up if I want, because it's permanent and never changes.
This could be done by hand on graph paper, although in this case, I used photo editing software for jpgs to upload. Doing it by manually helps me understand the concept and process, but I think the easiest way to do convert tie-up drafts to lifeplans would be with weaving software.
It's been 15 years since I used weaving software, so I'm curious to see what's out there nowadays. Especially what can run on Linux. So that's my next project.
4 comments:
Funny that you mention weaving software. Many years ago when I was a fledgling weaver, spinner, knitter there was the first of the rapidly emerging fiber stores. They came in all shapes and sizes , some offering only one journey such as knitting, spinning or weaving. Rarely then could one find a shop that offered all three and later ad dying. In our little shop one that carried the name Ancient Pathways and began with knitting and spinning grew into a full service stop. Patience I bet you are thinking I have lost my mind and fallen over the off topic cliff.
In the regulars who sat at the chairs and tables to ply their trades and visit for hours sat Lee. Both he and his wife,Beverly. They almost never missed a weekend . Lee's wife was a crafter and Lee was a spinner and a weaver. Lee spun cotton another rarity for a man at the time. But for a living Lee was an engineer. One day he walked in with a box of floppy discs, those little plastic squares with a tiny round piece in the middle. They were the first software for weavers any of us had ever seen. He managed in his spare time to load it with patterns from the first "language" that was used then and could be read by our first "desk tops" that could bring up the patterns on our screens. He sold them for a buck a piece and mine still lives in a box tucked away in the shop. The whole event came in on the ground floor as it were I could imagine similar to owning the first model T.
Lee passed a few years later far too early and I imagine his wife may have at some point but I moved away upon my husbands early retirement.
Goatldi, I'm guessing it was an old DOS program and I can almost picture it in my mind! Weaving is so logical and mathematical. I'm surprised there isn't more weaving software out there.
How lovely to live so close to a store that specialized in the fiber arts. Especially at a time when there wasn't the internet to browse for sources and ideas! I was fortunate to have a lot of resources where I learned to spin and weave. There's something about the hands-on experience with fiber and equipment that images on screens and in books can't compare to.
Leigh, having precisely zero experience with this, this almost strikes me as a sort of musical notation. One modifies the key and notes to change tune.
TB, to me it is a lot like music. It's just understanding the language and the symbols!
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