Testing it Out

We started working by taking the loom down to the basement of the church. There is a corner of the basement which will be perfect for the loom to fit. One problem we found with the loom was that there was too much friction between the plarn and the wood. In order to solve this problem, painters tape was placed over the holes, and old Hot Wheels track was glued over the PVC. The plarn was much easier to move afterwards. Next, more screws were put into the rail and stationary wall systems in order to hold them down permanently. More superglue was also placed along the edge of the magnets due to them falling off after the rail being used to often. The last piece of the build that had to be completed was putting eye-holes behind the rail wall where the plarn would be tied down. There we no problems completing this.

We decided to test the loom fully after the eye-holes were put into place. It took around two balls of plarn to string everything up, but there is a sizable "V" for string to be put through. We did run into a problem after the third or so movement. We realized that the tension between the string was causing the rail system to stop moving. In order to fix this, eye-holes will have to be put on the back. Stringing everything up the opposite way will prevent the string inside the mat from having to move. The other problem encountered was that the front wall bends under the pressure of the weights on the mat. A new wall will have to be made which is more stable. Hopefully, a mat will finally be able to be made within the next few weeks. Until then, a lot of time will be dedicated to creating as much plarn as possible.