My Ashford Jack Floor Loom

8 Shaft Kitchen Towels Project.

I have decided on a straight eights pattern for this project on the jack loom.

My project notes below

• Warp 616 ends plus 2 floating selvages either side /8 metre long
• Warp in White 10/2 mercerised cotton (Ashford)
• Pattern is from Ashfords website.
• 28 epi . 22 inches wide

Warp Wound and ready to start.

Winding on the warp

Using my homemade warping trapeze. ( I have noticed that if you are not very careful the warp twists as it is beaming which is what has happened to me this time.)

This is the first pattern I have chosen for one of the tea towels .

I used overlocker thread as a hem 1 1/4 ins and made a couple of errors in the treading in that section but its only the hem so i considered it didn't really matter. On to the main part of weaving with 10/2 mercerised cotton from ashfords, all was going well until i went to advance the warp (still having massive problems with that) and the front beaming stick tied to the apron gave way. The cotton string snapped as i was advancing that warp. To say the least i was devastated. I quickly checked to make sure that the stick hadn't snapped and went about using bricky's line cord to retie the front apron rod sticks. Hence why you may see a slight unevenness in my weaving. None the less all is back to normal and i am away weaving again. 

Next pattern i have chosen and here they are

Kitchen Towels Project mistakes and all. 

Its not until you take a photo that you see these mistakes and then sometimes its too late to fix them. I just snap photo’s so I can document the patterns and sometimes don’t look at them until a lot later maybe  when the weaving is finished. I will endeavour to watch for these mistakes and fix them in the future.

Yes thats right there is a mistake in this one

And i see one in this one as well

Second Project on the Ashford Loom
A baby blanket/summer wrap . It hopefully will be 38 inches by 38 inches when I have finished
I am using 10/2 mercerised cotton from Ashfords for the warp and weft.
Sett is 28 ends per inch
Width in reed 38 inches
1084 ends in total.
8 Shaft and 10 treadles will be used in this project.

Lots of heddles to thread below

More info on my main page of posts about some things that I have learnt from reading since my last project about solo warping and threading the heddles and wished I would have had this recent knowledge before I put this warp on.










  Here is my first video project on my beautiful Ashford Jack Floor Loom

Last November I purchased an Ashford Jack Floor Loom 8 Shaft/ 10 Treadle.
It was bought around 1990's. It has had one owner up until i acquired it.

Here is a photo of it being transported to its new home thanks to my husband. He just shakes his head at me sometimes.

I was so excited and happy but knew I had a lot of cleaning and tightening of bolts and screws. 

The loom itself is in fantastic condition , the wood pristine no chips or chunks out of it. 

Just a wee bit dusty and slightly wobbly because of being man handled and transported twice.

But all thats fixed now. 

Here is she once i gave it a good clean 

It has its first warp on it

Now to start weaving .

And the first weaving project is finished. It will be a set of 4 tea-towels.

I used Ashford Mercerised Cotton 10/2.  I know strange choice for tea towels but as I had bought a full set of these cottons from Petlins I felt that i should use what I had purchased. 

I used a 12 dent reed for this project and found the pattern through ravelry. I had enough warp for 4 tea towels and a large sample. The pattern was a 2/2 twill. 

I have washed and dried the fabric all ready to cut apart and sew.

They feel like they will be fairly absorbent but time will tell.

All finished.

They have turned out so well and I am very happy considering i am purely self taught. 

My selvages are even and the whole project was so enjoyable i can't wait to get the next one on the loom.

Till the next time.

My treadle tracker.

Here is the treadle tracker that I made to sit on my castle of the ashford jack floor loom.

I had bought the wooden object with holes pre-drilled from a second hand store a couple of years ago. It has moveable joints. I have no idea of what it was originally intended for maybe a game or some sort of counter , anyway I thought its wooden, it will be useful one day.
Then I started thinking recently about a tracking method for my treadling on the loom and I kept eyeing off this strange wooden object and thought I must be able to use it for something.
Last week I rearranged my weaving area in my craft room trying to make more room for the loom and weaving in general. I had my ashford warping board up on the way and had seen elsewhere on the net about a chalk board behind the warping board and thought it was a great idea. So I pulled apart my white board and placed it behind the board and then had all the aluminium frame and it had sliders. I suddenly thought I could use those. See how my mind works, every thing has a purpose and a use.

Anyway I decided that my strange wooden object, some numbered beads ordered through eBay,  a couple of lengths of dowel and leftover aluminium and magnets would go together to make my tracker.

Instructions,
Strange wooden object with holes pre-drilled.
2 lengths of dowel
numbered beads
aluminium  left over from sides of white board
2 magnets.
most importantly a hot glue gun that doesn't play up.

Method.
Cut lengths of dowel to suit holes to sit flush
Hot glue gun numbers onto cut dowel pieces
place in holes
aluminium to length ( mine just happened to be the perfect length
Glue magnets to raise the height of the aluminium glue one on the wood and one on the strip at the back so as not to get in the way of the sliders.
Place on castle.
Place numbers according to the treadling sequence. Top row is throw shuttle to the right and bottom row shuttle to the left.
I haven't placed those markings on my board yet but am intending to.
Anyway its just a prototype I haven't had a chance to use it but I fully believe that it will be very useful.
Anyway give it a go if your looking for something a little more substantial than beads on a string.

Di