Broken selvedge

[Dutch piper]

. Hi,

I recently made a kilt from a heavy weight wool. After I finished the kilt I noticed that the selvedge was “broken”. It seems that along the entire selvedge, there is showing a line where the threads seem to be “broken”.

Has anyone seen this before?
What can I do to avoid this from happening again with my future kilts?

Hope the pictures are clear enough.

[Steve Ashton]

Would it be possible for you to post a photo of the selvedge?

[BertMcG]

There are a few posts that talk about this issue with a tuck in selvedge, here is one with a solution
http://www.xmarksthescot.com/forum/f...elvedge-43690/

[Steve Ashton]

Check out the threads in the link above. That is indeed what is perfectly normal for fabric with a tuck selvedge.

Perhaps a little more of the ends showing that we usually see but there is nothing wrong.

You are also seeing the back side of the fabric. In the days when fabric was woven on shuttle looms the top or good side could be identified by the Twill line going from lower right to upper left as you face the selvedge.
On fabrics woven on rapier looms the Twill line goes is viewed along the length of the fabric so appears to go in the opposite direction when viewed as it is seen in a kilt.

These looms leave these ends of the tucked warp threads on the back side more than one the good side.

[figheadair]

Check out the threads in the link above. That is indeed what is perfectly normal for fabric with a tuck selvedge.

Technically/historically speaking there is no such thing as a tuck selvedge, it's either a self-edge (made in the weaving) or it's not.
A tuck edge is a better description and refers to something that is more akin to a hem than a selvedge.

In the days when fabric was woven on shuttle looms the top or good side could be identified by the Twill line going from lower right to upper left as you face the selvedge.
On fabrics woven on rapier looms the Twill line goes is viewed along the length of the fabric so appears to go in the opposite direction when viewed as it is seen in a kilt. These looms leave these ends of the tucked warp threads on the back side more than one the good side.

In traditional weaving terms there is no such thing as a good or face side to a piece of cloth, that is a result of the commercial finishing process but other than that there is no reason why the twill should not go bottom left to top right. Personally that is my preferred way.

[Steve Ashton]

You are absolutly correct Peter, but from down here at the kiltmakers level, the term selvedge is used for any edge which will not unravel so does not require a hem. I have also heard the top edge of a knitted sock called a selvedge.



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And the front/back thing comes from the step in the finishing process where the fabric is layed over a large light table and all the slubs pushed to the same side. When we build a kilt we lay out the fabric so the slubs are on the inside of the finished garment.

(as a side note I once built a kilt and had to add a small piece from another bolt. I was rushed and noticed slubs on the second piece. I oriented the fabric to keep the slubs on the inside. Only when the kilt was finished did another kiltmaker point out that three pleats had the Twill line running in the opposite direction. Very embarrasing.)

I do not know the reason, from a weaver's standpoint, why the direction of the twill line would be different on a rapier loom than it is on a shuttle loom. I was once in a weaving mill where they had recenly replaced some of their shuttle looms with rapier looms. They had hired new weavers along with the new looms. I casually asked each why the weavers created the Twill to run in a particular direction. Both weavers said "It's tradional to always make the Twill line run that way." Yet one loom had the Twill lines running from lower right to upper left and the other loom from lower left to upper right.