Back to the Mac

It’s funny how the smallest things can make a big difference.

Back in February I explained that one of the reasons my Macomber loom isn’t my favorite is that it has issues. The primary one is that with a warp more than a few inches wide, the warp threads on both selvedges become quite loose, requiring extreme tightening of the warp – a situation many fibers don’t care for.

After the towel warp came off the loom, I started by following through on my plan to tighten every screw and bolt I’d put in when I assembled it. Most were nice and tight, one was a bit loose, one quite loose. But lo and behold, I was shocked to be reminded that when I initially assembled it, I didn’t have enough screws to put one every place that it should have been, and simply left four screws out! Two on each side of the castle where it connects to the bottom cross member – YIKES!!

I exchanged a few emails with Sarah Haskell, the primary contact for Macomber. She got me the information about what size screws I needed to get, and my hardware store had them. I put them in, and then used the Mac to weave those baby blankets.

Now trust me, although I knew that it was wrong to operate the loom without those screws, I couldn’t imagine that it would make a difference in my loose warp threads issue. I didn’t expect any change in that situation.

HAH! Wrong again!

I had to use every single inch of width for that warp, going so far as to remove a few hundred extra heddles to allow the warp to extend to the full width of the harnesses. I set it all up, crossed my fingers, and lo and behold, every warp thread behaved perfectly! Nothing loose anywhere!

So while I my little counterbalance will always be my first love, it was a relative pleasure to weave on the Mac. So many other people absolutely love their Macs, and have nothing but praise for them — I’m hoping I can begin to appreciate all that the Mac has to offer as the years pass.

Your turn: what proved you wrong lately?