Updating my 1960s Kessenich Floor Loom

  My Kessenich Floor loom was made in the late 1960s by the original Kessenich loom maker in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.  It's made out of red oak.

  It needs some loving care and renovating.  The first problem is that the top of the beater bar is cracked in 2 places, so it will be repaired or replaced.

Apron and Cloth Beam
  The apron is very old and stained, so I took off the wooden pieces holding the cloth beam and washed the apron.  It's still pretty yellowed, so I will replace it.  I took the cloth beam metal rod off that holds the cloth brake, and there is a worn spot from the handle, so I'll have to look at that when I get it back on to see if the handle is still rubbing, or if it happened long ago and is no longer a problem.

Ancient Tie-up Chains
The tie up chains will be replaced by Texsolv cord and arrow pegs.  This won't be traditional to the loom, but it will be much easier to change tie-ups when weaving.  I took the harnesses out to see the tops of the tie-up chains where they connect to the lamms.

The old tie-ups were made of a chain that is called toilet chain because it's similar to that kind of chain.  The top of the tie-ups at the lamms were cotter pins that were cut off and bent to hold the chains at the lamms.  The lower part of the chain had the hook of a fishing swivel to attach to the treadles.  They are very old and very difficult to open, so Texsolv will be much better.  The current Kessenich loom maker has used Texsolv since 2004. Texsolv cord is available by the spool from weaving shops so I'm getting it and the arrow pegs from Yarn Barn in Kansas.

Here's a picture of the old tie-ups with the fishing swivel, which were used until the mid-1970s.

The fishing swivels:

Oiling the steel rollers 
The loom has spots where you need to oil the roller at the pulleys and on the inside of the castle at the steel rod.  To oil the top pulleys, I took off the 2 screws to the left and right top pieces of wood and oiled the rod so the pulleys will roll very freely.  I used sewing machine oil.  Bruce said to use machine oil or sewing machine oil.  It looks like there is some wear from a cord that must have been too big at some point by the right pulleys.

 These are the top pulleys after taking off the wooden piece on the left and right top of the castle.

These are the  holes where you squirt in 6-8 drops of machine oil.  Or you can oil it from the inside of the castle after taking the shafts out.

Black Pads--Replace
The 4 black pads that the shafts rest on and the lamms rest on (above the lamms) will have to be scraped off, the glue removed, and the pads replaced.  Bruce said you can use sponge rubber from a supply house that cargo haulers use.  I believe he said 1" wide and the strip should be 1/2" thick.  Use a little bit of coarse sandpaper to rough up the spot a little bit and glue the rubber down or get the pads from Bruce.

More loom renovation in my next post!