Supremely Beautiful
Seriously Functional
Textile Tools

Bluster Bay Textile Tools

CARE AND USE TIPS

• Caring For Bluster Bay Shuttles, Swifts and Skein Winders
• Instructions For Using Bluster Bay End-Feed Shuttles
• Making And Filling Quills For Swedish-Style Boat Shuttles

Caring For Bluster Bay Shuttles, Swift and Skein Winders

It's easy to keep your Bluster Bay shuttles, swifts and skein winders looking good and working perfectly for many years to come.

Bluster Bay tools have a durable oil and wax finish and should need little or no maintenance. If the shine begins to fade, you can gently buff the wood with grade 0000 steel wool and apply a light coat of furniture paste wax. We use natural-colored Briwax®. Buff with a soft towel. That’s it!

The metal spindles in our shuttles, and the shafts in our yarn swifts are silicon bronze, a metal that is extremely hard and abrasion resistant. Bronze will not rust, but it will lose its luster over time. If you wish to restore the shine of the shafts, simply buff them with grade 00 steel wool.

Instructions For Using Bluster Bay End-Feed Shuttles

Printable version of Instructions For Using Bluster Bay End-Feed Shuttles

YARN TENSIONING: End-feed boat shuttles use a special, tapered bobbin called a pirn that does not spin inside the shuttle as yarn is released. Instead, the yarn is released off the end of the pirn, through a tensioning device, and then out the side of the shuttle. This design allows for consistent weft tension no matter how much yarn is on the pirn. The result is faster weaving with smooth selvedges.

To thread your Bluster Bay end-feed shuttle:

1. Feed the weft yarn through the screw eye at the end of the pirn shaft. It may be easier to do this before you slip the fully wound pirn onto the shaft.
2. Pull the end of the yarn out the slot on the side of the shuttle.
3. To adjust the tension, hook the yarn around as many brass hooks as necessary. A small crochet hook may be of aid.

When tensioned correctly, the weft should unwind freely as the shuttle is thrown. It should neither pull too tightly nor leave loops of weft at the selvedges. The number of tensioning hooks you use will vary with every weft yarn. Bulky, fuzzy yarn may need no tensioning. Very fine linen, silk or Mylar filament may need to be looped around all of the hooks.

FILLING PIRNS:To unwind smoothly, end-feed pirns must be wound correctly. Many types of bobbin-winders can be used to fill pirns, including hand-operated and electric winders designed for side-delivery bobbins or paper quills. However, the shafts on some winders may need to be built up with masking tape, duct tape or surgical tubing to provide a snug fit for pirns.

When filling a pirn, always keep your tension very firm. The full pirn should feel hard. Begin winding yarn at the wide end of the pirn, initially covering about one inch. Gradually wind on more yarn, carefully following the cone shape of the pirn.

For 8” and 5½” AVL pirns, move down the pirn about one-half inch with each new layer of yarn. Each layer should cover no more than about two inches.

For the smaller Swedish paper pirns, move down the pirn less than one-half inch with each new layer of yarn and each layer should cover no more than about 1½ inches.

Keep in mind that the weft yarn will unwind off the small end of the pirn. Never wind too far forward or back over the area already filled. With practice, winding a pirn is no more difficult than filling a conventional, side-feed bobbin.

Making And Filling Quills For Swedish-Style Boat Shuttles

Printable version of Making And Filling Quills For Swedish-Style Boat Shuttles

Swedish-style boat shuttles are designed for use with paper quills instead of plastic or wood bobbins. Inexpensive, machine-made cardboard quills are available for purchase. However, many weavers make their own quills from scrap paper, providing themselves with an inexhaustible store of free weaving supplies.

Regular 20-lb or 24-lb office-weight paper, such as laser or ink-jet printer paper, typing paper or notebook paper, makes fine quills. There are several methods of cutting paper to wind into a quill:

No matter which shape you choose to begin with, the paper at its widest point should measure the desired finished quill length. For quills used with Bluster Bay shuttles, this measurement will be 3.5 inches (9 cm) or 5 inches (13 cm).

The length of the paper determines the final outside diameter and the quill's stiffness. Experience will teach you the best length to use, but a good length to start with is 8.5 inches.

Starting with the narrow end, make a quill by tightly winding the paper around the shaft of a bobbin-winder. Swedish-made bobbin-winders designed expressly for quills work best. When simultaneously making quills and filling them with yarn, the tightly wound quill is held in shape by the pressure of the yarn around it. If you are making a batch of quills to fill with yarn later, hold the tightly wound paper in place with a dab of quick-drying glue or a piece of cellophane tape.

There are two methods of filling quills. Weavers and authors of weaving instruction books often express strong preference for one method over the other, going so far as to pronounce the other method wrong. In fact, there is no one right or wrong way to fill a quill. The method you use will depend on the shuttle with which the quill is used, as well as just your own preference.

In one method, weft is built up on each end of the quill, them the center is filled in to level with the ends. This method works well with shuttles with very small exit holes, and where the quill completely fills the length of the bobbin hollow.

For the other filling method, weft yarn first traverses back and forth, the entire length of the quill. As the quill fills, this traverse becomes shorter and shorter, building a bulge in the center of the quill. This filling method works well with shuttles with long yarn exit slots, and if using a short quill in a long bobbin hollow.

Back to top of page