Has anyone used a second heddle as a pick up stick?  If so, how would you go about warping the second?  I'm thinking of a basic 'one up, one down' pick up and it seems to me you would put every other thread from the slot in the first heddle into a hole in the second and put ther rest of the first heddle threads into the slots in the second.  Am I right?  The more I think about it the more confused I make myself!

Comments

Wed, 12/18/2013 - 17:38

Sara von Tresckow

That might work, but would be quite inflexible. The beauty of a pickup stick is that you use it on your terms when you want to - varying the surface of your project sometimes across the whole width, sometimes just in selected places.

Why not just practice with your pickup stick and see how many variations it produces in a very efficient manner.

The whole double or multiple heddle thing is highly overrated, expensive, and my personal recommendation is that if you want to do more complex structures than plain weave, that you use the money spent on heddles, blocks, etc. to save up for a table or floor loom.

Wed, 12/18/2013 - 18:14

Erica

I believe your theory is sound. I think it would be easier to just put the pick up stick behjnd the heddle. It can be left tgere and turndd on it's side when needed.

Cheers,

Erica

Wed, 12/18/2013 - 20:13

endorph

it would be more trouble than it is worth - I use two heddles a lot and have no issue with them but not for pick up - for pickup patterns I use the pick up stick behind the heddle or string heddles, or depending on the pattern I want I will use the pick up stick in front of the heddles. I found that you can get pretty fast with pickup patterns the more you do them.

Wed, 12/18/2013 - 21:38

buckyscheerio

The project I'm planning will have some areas of krokbragd so I will need two pickup sticks and would have to set them both up with string heddles.  I thought I could use a second heddle in place of one and a pickup stick for the other?  I'm just not sure if I'm figuring the stringing of the second heddle correctly.

Wed, 12/18/2013 - 23:41

endorph

see it helping or working the way you want it to - plus you will have the weight of the second heddle to deal with - but hey - go ahead and try it and see if it works - who knows?

Fri, 12/20/2013 - 14:59

debmcclintock

you'll be happier with the regular heddle in front and two string heddles in the back, easier to push the string heddles back out of the way, as someoe else said, less weight to fight and the string heddles will give you your shed when you need it