Happy New Year!
What a year. If you’d told me at the beginning of the year what it would look like at the end, I’d have had a good laugh about it. Us? Moving? And to the country no less, No way. 2024 was supposed to be the year I relaxed and healed up from the renos in 2023.
We had some excitement along the way too (and how!). Continue reading 2024 Year End Wrap up plus a month
Well it’s been a minute!
We’ve been busy here since February just living life and working. I’ve also been trying to take it easy on my elbow tendons and thumb’s IPT joint. They’re all still acting up since the renos last summer.
I’ve been doing some sewing machine servicing but it takes a toll on both. One machine takes me the better part of a day because I have to modify my grip for my thumb and the tendons burn for a couple of days afterwards. Super fun.
So let’s see, what’s been happening? (spoiler, as usual – it’s a lot.)
I alluded to this in my previous post. A number of years ago, the power switches for the Pfaff 1222 type machines went “NLA” or No Longer Available. As usually happens, it takes a while for existing stock to disappear so many of us didn’t know until it was too late. Around the middle of 2020, it finally happened. Not long after my first order went unfilled, I started playing with the idea of rebuilding the switches. The reason being that it’s a single piece of (sometimes 40+ year old) injection molded plastic that fails. Every single time. Could it be 3D printed? After all, several years ago, I’d determined that the rest of the switch is high quality, modular and relatively easy to rebuild. In October of 2020, I received 4 Pfaff 1222 machines in for service and you guessed it, there was a broken switch among them and I had no more switches in stock.
After a series of unfortunate (family/personal) events that Fall, I finally began on Christmas Day 2020, and by a couple of days into the New Year, I had a working design and it took me about 15 minutes to disassemble the machine, disassemble the unnecessarily complex switch, replace the defective part, reassemble the switch and the machine. This could be a viable solution! The problem was Continue reading Pfaff Power Switches coming back!
A small update on the eSpinner and a tip for those who want a “remote” for their wheels.
When I built this wheel, I chose a 2.1mmx5.5mm plug. The input power is 12vdc and the tip of the connector is positive. This is a pretty standard setup and it allows me to use an off the shelf battery pack that’s pretty commonly used on many electric spinning wheels. Continue reading Here I go again! eSpinner remote hack and a few improvements
My overarching goal has always been making useful things useful again. That’s whether I’m fixing sewing machines, doing woodwork/woodturning, refurbishing spinning equipment or creating something in CAD from scratch.
I talked about 3d printers in a previous post and how they’re maybe not what people think they are, yet. That’s not to say they’re not ready to bring new life to things.
Every once in a while when I’m knitting on my antique sock knitting machine, I pull the bum off a cylinder needle. They’re basically latch hooks but with a foot or protrusion that the cams in the machine push up or down. Continue reading Future Starts Slow
As the year comes to a close, I had one last project to finish. Back in September, I prepared some rolags out of waste fibre when I was carding the Finn/Gotland locks. These were not the full of chaff and yuck parts. Just stuff that stuck in the cards but wasn’t short or full of neps.
I started spinning them on a cross-arm spindle shortly afterwards. It drafts beautifully and smooth despite being waste wool.
I mentioned back in August that one of the next projects on the list was the next version of the eSpinner. Well, September wasn’t the month for it. Mostly, I wasn’t really in the mood for CAD work and I knew there would be a lot of it.
The first week of December though – I was all over it. We had a brief cold spell and it seemed like a great time to take advantage of the time in.
I started the modifications on December 2nd and ended up doing the bulk of the CAD work over the next four days. At the same time, I began the printing. There were a couple of parts redesigned from scratch but most were modifications of the designs I’d created for the first version back in 2019 when I was learning CAD. This of course has its own pitfalls because how I design has changed a lot and what I did when I was learning was very inefficient. So in updating the files, I had a lot of things I needed to modify other than just dimensions of the drawings.
Here was the wish list for V2.0: Continue reading Mechanical Heart – version 2 of the eSpinner
By far, the biggest thing to happen in August was this Circular Sock Machine. I’d been looking casually for one for a year or so but finally put the word out that I was in the market. The goal being to use up some handspun because I spin much more and faster than I knit or weave.
Within hours, an acquaintance said she had been thinking of selling hers. We talked it over for a couple of weeks while she finished up one more project and then on Aug 13th, we went and picked it up. I’d never laid hands on a CSM in my life but I have used a flatbed knitting machine that I had to refurbish before I used it and already hand knit. I also enjoy a challenge – which most people warned me this would be. Everyone kept saying “there’s a big learning curve!” and there is but it’s no more difficult than learning to service vintage sewing machines. In fact, a lot of the logic process transfers across especially when troubleshooting tension or dropped stitches. Continue reading Older and Better – antique sock machine and revisiting projects
Back at the end of June, I was contacted by the Edmonton Fibre Frolic asking if I would like to provide 3D printed cross arm (AKA Turkish) spindles for their first Fibre Soiree. I contributed to the Curated Spinner’s box. This is the colourway I had to work with.
It’s an event going on as this post publishes. So hello to all of the Fibre Soiree’s new spindlers/spinners!
On the tags I attached to the spindles, I said the following:
In case the image is too hard to read, here it is: Continue reading Cross arm spindle care tips
Some of you may have noticed I have updated Archaic Arcane’s banner at the top of the site. I’ve put it on a rotation with the old banner, so here it is again if you see the old one above.
This came about finally due to a project I’m working on right now but realistically, I’ve been wanting an actual logo for almost 10 years.
I let it marinate in my mind and would periodically think about it but nothing really spoke to me. Then at the beginning of July, I began a collaboration project. I can’t say much about it until later in the month but one of the things they asked for was a copy of my logo in PNG format and a transparent background.
Whoops! I guess I better make one? They’re going to want business cards too, aren’t they? Oh boy. Nothing like a little pressure to spur some action! Continue reading Pushing Forward Back – or something like that
