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Warp messes and what I learned
My 13 yard warp for rep weave was a nightmare for several reasons. I didn’t wind it precisely and it looked like a sausage, which of course created tension problems. I was advised to rebeam and use more sticks , or paper. I chose sticks so I could see the alignment of the threads on the sides.
Also, Kelly Marshall in her excellent book Custom Woven Interiors had recommended winding with 4 threads at a time. Well. I used 2 different colors warping back to front and frankly, had a mess of threads needing to cross each other for threading. Incidentally, she advises when winding the same color over inches, to mix that color with another very close shade to give the flat color more vibrancy.
The good news is I wound the cotton with the spool laying on a spike parallel to the ground, so I didn’t add more twist in the winding, and it did make are a difference. Janet explained that to me.
My takeaways are to be very careful winding on the warp, use many more sticks, align the cotton at the sides, and to wind my warp with more than 1 thread only if the colors are the same. First wound warp and second rebeamed.
What messes taught you something?
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7 Replies
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Without being there while you worked, it is hard to know precisely where the issues that caused grief were generated.
That said, I routinely wind warps two threads at a time. If they don’t have a lot of twist energy, that doesn’t cause problems for me.
I routinely use two slightly different values of the same hue in a cloth (one of each as I wind my warp) so I concur with Kelly’s advice to add a bit of liveliness to the cloth.
When winding a warp I tend to pull off the end of the tube or cone rather than the side, especially if using a warping board. I find it just works ‘better’ for me. Generally, as long as I am consistent about what direction the yarn winds off, there are few issues (again, if the yarn doesn’t have a lot of twist energy in it – in that case other measures need to be taken).
One of the pitfalls weavers fall into is holding the yarn with a death grip while they wind. This can cause issues as the yarns begin to bend the pegs inwards making the last threads shorter than the beginning ones.
I tie the cross on the four ‘arms’ of the X rather than around the waist of the X which makes finding the cross easier.
Overloading the board can also cause issues. The widest chain I make is 15″ on the board – and that’s pushing it because I know I can.
Beam with tension on the warp. That will solve a host of issues. Firm warp packing is better than limp (imho).
Anyway, try different things. Note what works – and what doesn’t. Fine tune your processes. Learn the principles of the craft and when to adjust what you are doing to reduce frustration.
Keep weaving. :)
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Thanks for the tips, Laura. I figure winding 2 threads at a time will work well. I did 4. When I wound the beam I drifted right as I wasn’t carefully watching how it was aligning. I wind by myself.
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When you say it drifted to the side, were you using a raddle or reed to space the warp? Sometimes a reed will shift sideways in the beater if I’m not careful, although I find it does that much less now that I use a warping valet.
Anyway, keep going. Learning about weaving is a banquet we eat dish by dish. :)
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Yes indeed Laura! The second time I noticed the reed was moving around and ai had to be more careful. The first beaming involving a raddle likely shifted too. I wondered how it got so misaligned!
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Hmm, you might be able to use something to hold the reed in place. Maybe a couple big elastic bands in the bottom of the channel the reed sits in? Something to keep it from slipping…
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You helped me out with that observation! Of course that is how it got misaligned.
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I always wind more than 1 thread at a time (I’ve done up to 7 a couple of times, and plan to do 8 soon). I have a warping paddle that I clamp to a table near my warping mill and use it to keep the threads organized (before I used the paddle, I had problems with the warp ends getting tangled behind the heddles). As to my personal worst nightmare? Taking the warp off the warping mill before preserving the cross–managed to weave maybe half of it before I gave up in despair.
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