Heddles to the Right of Me, Heddles to the Left of Me...

    I'm doing that most dreaded of chores: moving heddles on Bertie.
    I am lazy. Laziness isn't a bad thing: I'm organized because I want to be as efficient as possible with my time and energy. Laziness also means that I want to spend my time and energy on things I like (throwing a shuttle), so things that aren't that are on a list that ranges from "dislike" to "absolutely hate." Things I dislike (but do) include warping and threading heddles--they're chores, but necessary for the reward of throwing a shuttle.
    At the top (or bottom) of the list is moving heddles. It doesn't matter what kind of heddles they are--flat steel; wire; inserted eye; or Texsolv--counting them out, bundling them up, then moving them is, in my opinion, a complete pain in the ass and something to be avoided whenever possible. I avoid moving heddles very often by being organized: I make sure there are enough heddles on each shaft to avoid running out, and I mark the center heddle on each shaft so I can balance the number of unused heddles on each side of each shaft.
     I will also state here and now that I loathe Texsolv heddles. (For those unfamiliar, Texsolv polyester heddles were invented to replace the string heddles used on a lot of Swedish looms.) I like metal heddles, especially inserted-eye heddles: they kind to the warp, easily slide on the heddle bars (especially when the bars are waxed), and it's easy to use a threading hook to flick them into position for threading. Texsolv does none of those things: they can abrade a delicate warp; they don't easily slide on the wood heddle sticks; and they're so floppy the only way they are easily threaded is one at a time with my fingers. Their only saving grace is that they're light as feathers, so the don't interfere with the shedding action on Bertie.
    When I got Bertie, I knew it was going to be difficult to determine an individual warp end having a problem with its assigned heddle, so I made the decision to "color code" the shafts. This is pretty common among weavers with many, many shaft looms, and solutions range from coloring individual heddles with Sharpie markers to painting them with diluted acrylic or fabric paints to dyeing them. Each has its drawbacks: Sharpie markers fade; acrylic and fabric paints flake when they get old; polyester requires special dyes. I knew where to get polyester dyes, so I ordered three colors of dye--purple; green; gold--and proceeded to sort and dye about 75% of Bertie's 4,000 heddles. The heddles dyed beautifully, and I got them resorted, bundled, and onto the shafts so I could do a decent amount of weaving last year.
    Fast-forward to 2019, and I am dealing with a warp that was becoming a "dog." Dog warps happen when something is seriously wrong with the design, the warp, or the loom, and they're awful--you don't want to weave off the warp because it's so much work, but you don't want to take the scissors to it. In this case, the dog is nearly 30 yards of white 8/2 cotton for weaving towels (484 ends), so I can't afford to scrap that much yarn, but I keep getting tiny random floats that ruin the cloth. I finally found the problem--the heddles shrank when I dyed them, leaving the undyed white heddles 7/16"/1.12cm longer than the dyed heddles. They're "sloppy," and get tangled around the adjacent shafts, causing the floats, then untangle when the adjacent shafts are raised. These random floats don't show up on broken twills and warps with matching wefts; on the other hand, they're really noticeable on my "bread and butter" towel warps. These are warps where I weave the same design in eight different colors, so the warp is a single color, but each towel is a different weft color. The designs also feature a lot of plainweave, so any imperfection stands out against that plain background.
    There's only one solution for this problem: treat the undyed heddles to the same conditions that caused the shrinkage in the dyed heddles. In other words, take all the undyed heddles off the loom, throw them in a pot with water (and a little Synthrapol), and simmer/boil them for 30-45 minutes. I tested my theory, then got to work fixing this problem. Since I have to take the heddles off the loom, this is an opportunity to thoroughly clean and oil the loom, update the Lenovo Yoga Laptop/Tablet that I use to run the dobby head, and reorganize the heddles to better take advantage of the shafts. Meanwhile, the warp--with the threading cross on a pair of lease sticks--is resting at the back of the loom until I'm ready to thread heddles again.