When you buy a rigid heddle loom, it comes equipped with one heddle – usually a 7.5 or 8 dent, depending on the company you purchase from.
Before I go any further, I just want to say that when talking about rigid heddle looms, the terms “heddle” and “reed” are usually interchangeable but mean the same thing. For the rest of this article, I will use the term “heddle”.
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The actual “rigid heddle” part of a rigid heddle loom is one of the features that makes it such a great loom for learning how to weave. The heddle is a multi purpose piece of equipment. It spaces your warp, allows you to achieve two different shafts and is also your beater. It’s pretty awesome!
One heddle equals two shafts. The holes are one shaft and the slots are another. So, a rigid heddle loom can be called a two shaft loom, though there are some hot debates about this (Facebook, I keep out of these arguments!) as some people argue that a rigid heddle produces sheds not shafts.
Not really worth arguing over in my opinion, as whatever the case, you can weave 2 shaft drafts (plain weave) with one heddle and a rigid heddle loom.
You may assume then, that when you add a second heddle, you can then weave a 4 shaft pattern, but that is not so.
“What? Didn’t you just say that one heddle equals two shafts? Now I’m confused!”
One heddle does equal two shafts when used on it’s own. BUT, adding an extra heddle does not add two extra shafts, because the slots can only be counted as one shaft.
Before you throw your hands up in frustration and storm away from this page, let me give you an example:
I’m using two heddles. On heddle one, I’m using the holes as shaft 1. On heddle two, I’m using the holes as shaft 2. That leaves the slots for shaft 3.
Think of the threads in holes as dedicated – they’re on one set path that can’t be changed once they’re threaded in. If I lift heddle one, all the shaft 1 hole threads will go up and the slot threads stay down. If I lift heddle two, all the shaft 2 hole threads will go up and the slot threads will stay down. The only way I can make the slot threads go up would be to put both heddles in the down position, forcing the hole threads down. So you see that the slot threads operate differently to the hole threads and can’t be manipulated in the same way.
It seems that the desire of weavers to explore and push the boundaries of their looms has been influential in loom production. Many commercially available rigid heddle looms now come with a built in double heddle block rather than just the single they used to be made with. This is a pretty good indicator that weavers want to weave with more than one heddle!
But what can you actually do with more than one heddle? Let’s take a look at the possibilities.
- Two heddles to increase your sett.
Say you want to weave a yarn at 20 ends per inch (epi). There is no heddle available that can do that for you, the closest sett available is a 15 (which will give you 15 epi), and that just won’t do when you want to weave at 20 epi! If you use 2 x 10 dent heddles, that will give you 20 epi.
2. Two heddles increase your pattern possibilities.
You can set up your loom with an extra heddle instead of a pick up stick to weave all kinds of patterns. You can consider an extra heddle as an extra shaft, so using two heddles will allow you to weave a three shaft pattern. And there are lots of three shaft patterns to choose from!
I really enjoy weaving with extra heddles in place of pick up sticks or heddle rods. The set up time is less and the weaving is more straightforward.
3. Two heddles allow you to weave double width cloth.
This is one of those eye opening weaving revelations that is just so exciting to discover. Your loom is not wide enough for the project you want to weave. With two heddles, you can weave double your loom’s available weaving width. It’s like magic!
Weaving with more than one heddle is such a popular topic that I have several resources available for weavers who wish to explore further:
Online classes-
PDF Patterns-
And if you’re up for a challenge, this class will walk you through how to weave on three heddles!
I hope this post was interesting and helpful to you, please leave me a comment to ask questions or let me know if you enjoyed this.
Until next time…
Happy Weaving!