Now that I have my heddle jig for making long-eye heddles for the drawloom, this was a good day to begin. I had removed an old “string” heddle from the loom to use for placement of nails, and have left it on the jig to follow where to tie the square knots. Using seine twine, I’ve begun cutting lengths and tieing long-eye heddles.

I’m not sure yet how many I will need to make but figuring it will be 1,000 or more, as there are only 100 or so on each ground shaft right now. Yes, I could order Texsolv heddles, but I like having the old-style string heddles on this loom, so plan to keep it this way for now. I’ve also been making my own pattern heddles, as I did around 23 years ago. Also, the cost of changing over to all Texsolv heddles for ground and pattern harnesses would be significant.

I will be changing other tie-ups (shafts to jacks) over to Texsolv cord, as well as using Texsolv cords from jacks to treadles. In these cases, I prefer the Texsolv for making adjustments over tieing knots in the old way. Sometimes, convenience wins out.