I found someone on the recommendation of a weaver friend who has this 15-inch Schacht Cricket Loom I could rent for a small sum so I picked it up and started a weaving project with some yarn my weaver friend gave me. here is the result of my two day project.
The project is more of a test/sample/learning piece than a finished usable object. I used it to mostly concentrate on achieving nice selvedges and learning how to work the rigid heddle. And just have some fun.
15-inch Schacht Cricket Rigid Heddle Loom. It comes with clamping pegs, reed hook, warping peg, 8 dent rigid heddle and an instruction booklet.
Here I have the warp wound and tied on the loom almost ready to start weaving the next day. The warp is 5/2 mercerized cotton. Single threads sleyed in the reed.
The warp threads are single 5 Purple threads and the weft is is made of 4 threads 5 Purple, Copper, Cobalt Blue, and Cranberry. Every other shot is a single strand of 5 Purple yarn. It is a plain weave patter that is weft faced.
Here is the completed weave off the loom. I started weaving in the morning and it finished by the afternoon.
I ended up with a couple of weft floats. This is the top side showing one of the weft floats.
Here is the back side showing the warp float.
I was having too much fun that I didn’t take the time to weave in the end of the weft yarns and the beginning of a new set of weft yarns. See the next picture of how I thought of doing it after the fact.
This is how I would have connected the end and beginning of weft yarns.
Here is the project after washing in the washing machine, drying, and trimming the fringe. I used various combinations of the 4 yarn colors to see what I would end up with.