Media Category: supplement

Printable (PDF) Hand Looms Supplement order form, through October 2020

Side view of loom frame shows metal piece attached to bottom of desk. Side piece of beater is hinged from that piece.

Detail of warp beam of loom showing the pre-wound spools.

Chair with cushion attached to metal frame on the floor, other end of frame has metal pole that holds school desk. On top of desk is loom frame, with warp spools at back on right side, warp threads going through a reed; middle posts support a bulletin board and fluorescent light; treadles are attached to metal frame on the floor.

Metal label reads “Devereux Loom
Devereux Mansion Workshop
Marblehead, Mass. U.S.A.”

Wooden loom frame is painted green, six treadles visible; beater and reed frame painted red; apron to which the warp is attached shows threads just coming over breast beam. Cones of yarn can be seen on shelves in background.

A diagram with measurements of a small floor loom with square lower frame; six treadles; beater and reed hinged on the bottom; two posts at the middle of frame have a bar across that rolls and holds the cords that are attached to the four shafts.

Printed cover of booklet titled “Directions for The Barbour Linen Loom [1906],” picture shows woman sitting on bench in front of small loom lifting the heddle that holds the threads.

Square wooden frame with round beam on right side and two round beams on the left.

Side view of Barbour loom with small warp tied to warp beam on right and breast beam on left. Heddle is raised to show shed. On inside of loom is the metal Y-shaped mechanism that controls the movement of the heddle.

A large round beam rests in a holder behind the back vertical support. At the end is a large wooden disk with evenly spaced holes bored into it. A large hole set into one of the holes would set the tension on the warp.

Round wooden beam has ratchet at end where it attaches to lower side member of loom. Long wooden pawl holds the beam in place.

Large wooden loom with tall the back-support units, a second pair of supports attached to the two sets horizontal side pieces. the upper set being fairly wide. The top horizontal units on each side extend from the back, beyond the secondary support. A pole across them hold two sets of pulleys from which hang the small pieces of wood to which the two shafts are attached. The overhead beater holds the reed. Shorter lower supports hold the breast beam. A partially woven rag piece and warp are on it The lower sides have a board between them in the front to form a bench. A piece of cloth and two sticks rest on it.

Warp beam clamped to tile worktable; right side diagonal support beam attached to horizontal piece, holds right end of swinging beater; warp threads waiting to be threaded through heddles on shafts.

Small wooden floor loom unwarped. Side view shows beater that is attached at bottom leaning against cloth beam; two treadles attached at front. Two posts along sides hold a rod from which hang two shafts; warp beam has wooden ratchet and pawl.

Old fashioned photograph of young woman in Colonial costume standing in front of wooden floor loom; from side view can see it has two shafts; loom is warped; woman has hand on beater that is attached on the bottom. Background contains a tall wooden chest and a chair.

Line drawing of wooden 2-shaft floor loom with two treadles; beater attached at bottom frame, shafts set into castle frame. Shows partially woven warp with a shuttle resting on top.

Line drawing of rectangular wooden tabletop frame loom with rollers at back and front; rigid heddle held by short posts in the middle. Shows partially woven warp with shuttle in the shed.

Side pieces of rear section reinforced by flat metal rods. Wooden warp beam divided by pegs, rear beam has built in raddle that aligns with pegs. Metal friction brake on inside of right rear post, metal crank with wooden handle on outside.

Wooden floor loom, counterbalance, with 4 shafts and 4 treadles, beater attached at bottom; shafts attached to castle above. White fabric apron on cloth beam.

HandloomIndex1-20 A

Index to the Handloom Supplement, issues 1-20.

Cover for Hand Loom Supplement Compilation, issues 1-10

Hole-and-slot tape loom with two sets of holes, one above the other. The loom frame is a rectangular box without a top. The the short sides of the rectangle form the front and back of the box and are taller than the long sides. The warp beam is set into supports at the back of the box. The heddle is inset on the front of the box. The top of the piece of wood forming the back side of the box, behind the warp beam, has some decorative woodwork, as does the top of the heddle board. The cloth beam is mounted behind the heddle board, inside the box on one of the lower side walls. Below the heddle there is a horizontal slot in the front board. The slot is in line with the cloth beam mounted inside the loom frame. The loom is warped and there is a shuttle and partially-woven tape at the front of the loom. The tape is not being fed through the horizontal slot below the heddle. The loom is based on examples from European folk-history museums. Built by Fred Hatton.

100 inch (2.54 m) Clement jack loom from Canada. Four treadles, very low castle, beater bar hinged on the bottom of the frame. There are four horizontal metal tubes above the treadles, attached to the treadles via L-shaped hinged metal pieces. The L-shaped pieces are also attached to metal rods that go through the back of the treadles and attach to the shafts. There are two weaving benches set up along the front of the loom.

Side view of a mid-19th century four-post countermarche loom from Banbury, England, designed for weaving plush. It appears to be well-used, with very dark wood that shows wear. The loom is not warped and the shafts are at a slight angle. There three shafts and four treadles. The loom has some metal elements (the pivot points for the lamms, some elements on the shafts, some nails, and possibly the cloth beam, though the cloth beam may be worn-smooth wood). The loom is fairly self-contained, with two warp beams on the outside of the rear posts, but attached to them. The shaft mechanism extends outside of the loom fame on the top, as does a structure on top of the crossbar for the hanging beater bar.

A 4-shaft table loom from the Depression (U.S.) / New Deal era (1930s) used by the Civilian Conservation Corps. The loom is warped and appears to have string heddles. There are levers on top of the castle that are used for lifting the shafts.

Large custom-built tapestry-style loom for knotted-pile weaving. The loom is very tall and quite shallow; about a quarter as deep as it is tall or wide. The loom is warped, with some knotted pile cloth in the working area and on the cloth bar. There appears to be a warp bar, with the warp extending over the top of the loom frame. There is a shed stick to create one shed, and rod with looped string heddles to control the second shed. Built by Simon Fraser at the request of Vicki Fraser.

Sample from Loom Manual Library. Instruction booklet for Weavers Delight Loom Newcomb Loom Company. Text & layout:
“This Envelope contains
Detailed Instructions
for Unpacking and Assembling the
Weavers Delight Loom
While practically all of this information is contained in the Instruction Book we have deemed it advisable to issue a separate sheet devoted entirely to unpacking and assembling.”
Image of loom with various parts labelled on loom. Labelled parts include: rear roller, warp beam, beam crank, trigger stick, picker strap, picker stick, hinge rod, heddle frames, hand rail, lay or beater, cloth roller, tension rod, and lever L & pawls. The horizontal support is labelled “Weavers Delight (indecipherable)
Newcomb Loom Co.
Davenport Iowa,” though parts of this label are obscured by the picker stick. Below the image of the loom the text continues:
“Study this skeleton illustration
You will get a very good idea of where the various parts belong and how they appear when properly placed in position.
Pay special attention to the ‘Rear Roller’ over the warp beam, the ‘Hinge Rods,’ and the Trigger Stick.’
Newcomb Loom Co., Davenport, Iowa U. S. A.”

Harness and heddle maker: two parallel wooden structures held together by a rod. The parallel wooden structured are supported by two legs each. The wooden structures each have a round hole in that aligns with the hole in the other wooden structure, and there are two rectangular cutouts on each side of the round holes. A dowel would fit through the round holes at the top, and two slats would be in the rectangular cutouts. Heddles are knitted around the slats and dowel, forming the heddle eye.

Diagram A: the lever action of lamms in relation to a shaft and a treadle. Two long rectangles with labels. Both have an unlabelled red circle on one end (this is likely intended to indicate where the lamm is attached). Both rectangles have an arrow pointing to the horizontal center of the rectangle labelled “Shaft cord.” The top diagram is labeled “This Lamm is a Class 3 Lever” and has a second arrow pointing to a spot about 3/5 of the way between the red circle and the Shaft Cord. This spot is labelled “Treadle cord.” The bottom diagram is labelled “This Lamm is a Class 2 Lever” and has a second arrow pointing to a spot about 2/5 of the way between the center point marked “Shaft cord” and the end of the rectangle that does not have a red circle.

45″, four-post, 2-shaft English-style counterbalance barn-frame loom with back and center uprights and overhead beater.

60″ 12-shaft countermarche loom built by Andeas Kohmann in Bamberg, Germany. Side view shows automatic take-up system, a set of three visible, interlocking gears. The gears are mounted on what appears to be a flat metal support that is slightly convex, towards the back of the loom. The metal support is attached to the top and bottom side supports of the loom. The upper of the three gears has a crankshaft attached, which rests on a smooth wooden cog. There is twine attached to the crankshaft that leads to the take-up system via a support beam above the castle. The are eight visible treadles and the release for the warp beam is visible. The loom is set up to use eight of the twelve shafts and treadles.

The Huffmans’ incomplete Mendenhall semi-automatic, central post, counterbalance loom, side view. A rough-looking wooden loom with a fairly tall castle. There are no visible treadles. A metal axel runs along the width of the loom between the warp beam and the castle supports. There are metal gears or cranks (about double the diameter of the warp beam) capping each end of the axel vertically, and a gear with a diameter slightly smaller than the warp beam in the middle of the axel. The large metal gear attached to the axel in the foreground appears to be connected to the beater bar via a rope or wooden crankshaft.

Complete Branson semi-automatic, central post, counterbalance loom. Courtesy of American Textile History Museum. There are no visible treadles. A large metal gear is positioned just behind the castle supports and partially covered by a horizontal piece of wood supporting the reed. The large gear appears to be connected to the beater bar by a piece of rope or a wooden dowel. Four pulley holders are suspended from a head roller between the upper castle support and the shafts. There is a fairly large recurved crankshaft that may connect to a beam that is situated between the breast beam and the cloth beam.

 S. C. Mendenhall’s Hand Loom, Patent #22,533, January 4, 1859. A patient drawing for a semi-automatic counterbalance loom. No treadles are present. The drawing shows a gear or pulley between the warp beam and the castle supports, a fairly tall castle with a pulley system for the shafts, an attachment point for the beater bar on the lower crossbeam, and recurved front corner posts.