Removing the blocking pin

Good for both Spring 1 and Spring 2

When your loom is set up, and likely before you put a warp on, you may want to remove the blocking pin to see what happens. What you will notice is that all your shafts will drop. This is one of the most common areas of concern and generates many questions.

Do not worry—this is normal and expected behavior.

Before removing the blocking pin, take a close look at your loom. On each side, you will see an inner Texsolv cord and an outer cord. You’ll also notice that the two shaft bars and the upper lam bar are attached to the outer cord, while only the lower lam bar is connected to the inner cord. This creates a natural weight imbalance, and gravity does the rest. The three bars connected to the outer cord outweigh the single bar on the inner cord, causing the shafts to drop.

How does this change once you begin weaving? First, with a warp on the loom, the shafts cannot drop lower than the plane of the warp threads. Second, once you tie up your treadles, the weight imbalance begins to reduce. Additional factors include warp density, warp tension, the number of shafts tied up, the number of treadles tied up, the weight of the harnesses (one shaft bar may be slightly heavier or lighter than another), and the width of your warp.

If you are weaving with 8 or more shafts across the full weaving width and have 10 treadles tied up, you will see that the harnesses drop very little, if at all.

Always keep in mind that the Spring is a countermarch loom. With every treadle depression, all shafts are either pulled up or pulled down. This means your warp threads are always brought to their correct position. No thread can stick or avoid being moved.