The new loom arrived! Step by step assembly

I ordered my new Kromski Harp loom from Paradise Fibers in Oregon, and I have to say that I was extremely pleased with their selection and service.  I ordered the loom and some extra accessories on October 12 and 13 and the loom arrived by October 17, even with delays in customs. 

The full loom kit includes all the parts of the loom plus accessories like a 8 dent heddle, a pick up stick, heddle hook, a couple of stick shuttles, warping pegs and clamps. 

The down side is that the loom arrives unassembled.  The good side is that the loom is actually quite easy to assemble, with one minor hiccup around the direction of the gears (that was readily fixed). 

Step 1 was to attach the little tooth gripper things that fit into the gears on the loom that keep the beams from spinning uncontrollably.  I am sure those things have a technical name, but I sure as hell don't know it.  Ah well. 

Step 2 is to lay out the loom parts in position, then attach the bottom braces and beams. 

 

Then comes the time to attach the handles onto the ends of the front and back beams.

Once the handles were attached, it was time to attach the heddle holder. 
 

Save for attaching the front and back warp assists, the loom was complete and ready to start weaving.  From start to finish it took only about an hour to assemble the loom, which is less time than I expected. 

The base loom comes with stick shuttles, and I picked up a couple of Leclerc boat shuttles (size slim and size small to fit through the shed in a rigid heddle loom).  The boat shuttles are made of Canadian Maple and are beautiful and they feel lovely in the hand.  Having spent the weekend weaving with these shuttles, I have to say that they are a wonderful addition to my tool kit.

Because I am inherently lazy I also picked up a Leclerc bobbin winder and extra bobbins so that I could quickly load up several bobbins in each working colour, which was a tip I picked up from a video on the Paradise Fibers youtube channel.  This definitely made weaving quick and easy, with little time wasted when changing bobbins and/or colours, and I really recommend these.

After watching one of Tim Horchler's very informative videos on warping the loom using warp sticks to keep the warp threads separated I also made sure to order a set of warp sticks.  I used these when weaving my first and second sample projects and they really help keep the tension even.

The Kromski Rigid Heddle loom comes with an 8-dent heddle, and I ordered a second, 10-dent heddle for finer wools.  Having played with both heddles on my sample cotton yarn last weekend, I have just ordered a 12-dent heddle.  The new heddle is not just because my sample projects turned out spacier than I anticipated, but also because a 12-dent heddle is called for by some of my pattern kits.

Anticipating bringing the loom with my on the road to family visits, I also picked up a loom bag.  The nice thing about the Kromski Harp loom is that it can fold up with the work on it and be tucked away into the loom bag.  I have tried folding the loom without work on it, and it works perfectly.

Because I have impulse control issues, I have already tried a couple of test swatches.  My next post will describe my trials and tribulations playing with my new loom.