Shekere / Sekere

Shekere / Sekere.

A few weeks ago I found a Shekere in a charity shop in Eton whilst out shopping in Windsor.

It was pretty grubby and the netting was a nice shade of nicotine and coffee brown, with the long ends of the net hanging in a frayed mess, urgh! 

But as I am interested in all things to do with net making, no matter how tatty looking I had to have it for interests sake. 

I only paid £2.00 for this item so in any state it was a real bargain.

(note: all pictures are of the refurbished Shekere, as I forgot to photograph it in its original state)

I took off the beaded skirt and soaked it in a concentrated stain remover for a few hours and then poured off the almost black liquid. I then soaked it over night in a strong biological washing liquid solution and gave it a  thorough rinsing.

The net came out a bright white just like new, and the beads also looked just like new.

I scrubbed the Gourd body with a mildly abrasive but non scratch citrus cleaner and the Gourd turned from a coffee stained brown to a nice orange brown colour. I also sanded the top of the opening smooth and straight as this had just been left ragged by the maker. 

There was a marble stuffed into the top of the opening which took an age and some ingenuity to remove without damaging the neck of the Gourd, and then also some loose debris inside which was left from the the Gourd not being cleaned out was removed.

It was amazing what a difference this made to the tone and resonance of the gourd which was actually quite good for its 8" diameter and small opening.

I polished the Gourd body with a quality wax polish, though I could have also oiled it with Danish oil or similar, some people use a Polyurethane coating on the outside but I think it looks too unnatural and plastic, just like the beads, but they seem to be the best thing for the job.

I replaced the netting, and decided to finish the bottom of the net off with an extra row of meshes and an adjustable cord rather than the long tail of knotted cords as was original, the tone of the gourd seemed to be dampened with the long tails when hitting the bottom with the heal of the hand, you can use either method and each has a slightly different playing style.

I could have completely replaced the net with my own but for the sake of it the original net was fine, if a little unevenly tied in a coupe of places, and for £2.00 I am not complaining as I have a nice little instrument now, which also sounds pretty good for its size.

Take care,

Barry ;-) 

Net Making Tools (p2)

Here is another selection of tools I use for net making, Including Netting Needles, a Needle Winder and a Netting Stand Click on the pictures to see them full size.

Netting Needles or Shuttles.
OK, I admit it; I have a Netting Needle fetish ;-)
Here is a selction of the needles I have in my collection, all are manufactured from various plastics. Sorry to all the wood purists out there that like to make their own; maybe next time I will have some wood needles to show.
By the way if you have never made a wood needle for yourself, I can highly recommend doing it, you will learn a lot by making your own; and there is nothing quite like making an piece of netting with the tools  that you have also made.

Here are some injection moulded Nylon needles, in 6, 10,  12, 14, 16 and 20 inch lengths.

 A well known passage molded on one of the needles pictured above, though what the words have to do with net making is beyond me, obviously designed by a knot tyer that could not think of something netting related to have molded into the needle ;-) I like it non the less though.

Norwegian Netting Needles, from Norway just incase you were wondering.
These are my favorite needles, made from Acetal, an engineering plastic; which is very strong and hard wearing, I have many sizes of these varying from 6.5mm wide x 100mm long, up to 32mm wide x 310mm long. the largest of which I use for my Hammocks and normally have 30 of them filled and ready for action to make each hammock body.
I do keep a large stock of these needles for sale; but they are not cheap.

 Toka Needles, in 8, 10, 12, 14 and 27 mm widths and vary from 5.5 - 9.5 inches long, I don't bother with these much; though the smallest size is great for making small mesh netted items.

Some more molded Nylon needles, I don't like these much as they have a short body section so don't hold very much twine, these needles are in 5, 6, 7, 8 and 10 inch lengths.

 Glass reinforced Nylon? needles from Loomis, U.S.A. same pattern as the Norwegian needles but in my opinion they are not nearly as nicely made.

Some basic plastic needles in 6, 8 and 10 inch lengths, the plastic is a little more flexible than Nylon but the design of these needle is very well thought out; having a long tongue which touches the top of the opening; they will not spill twine when dropped, and they also hold a fair amount of twine, and I prefer these to the Nylon types.
I use these needles for workshops and teaching, and also keep a fair stock of them for sale.

Some small Nylon needles which I bought at a knot tying meeting; I only bought them because I could not find anything else I wanted; and hated having to go away empty handed.
These are 6" long and the body is slimmed down allowing a larger amount of twine to be wound on the needle without bulking out too much.

These plated steel needles are used for very fine decorative and Guipure netting, these particular needles are cheaply made and tend to have burs or plating defects which can catch on the twine being used, you can buy good reproduction brass copies of this type of needle but they are fairly pricey, I am not really into doing this type of netting, but the finished articles can be very beautiful indeed.

You can never have too many needles, OK so maybe I have a few more than I really need, but when making any piece of netting; I may have up to 25 or 30 needles filled and ready to use, there is nothing I hate more than having a needle run out of twine when I am going at full steam, and having to start winding another needle full of twine, better to have enough wound up before starting on your project.

 Needle or Shuttle Winder.

My; now not so Top Secret Weapon! and before anyone asks, I can not make you one; sorry, I no longer have access to the tools and materials to do this sort of work now.

The device will only work with Norwegian style needles that have a "H" or "I" beam type cross section.

I can fill any size of needle I have in seconds, and winding up many needles is no effort at all.

Here pictured with a 12" Norwegian needle

The Netting Stand.



This netting stand is based on a design used by net makers on the island of Vinalhaven in Maine, U.S.A and is described in the book "Down East Netting" by Barbara M. Morton.

The stand is used for braiding (or knitting) small net items such as Lobster trap heads (entrances) and bait bags to go inside the traps.

The small box at the bottom of this stand has weights in it to stop the stand from being pulled over whilst pulling the knots tight, the top box is for holding spare needles and mesh sticks (Gauges).
The netter or group of netters would sit by the stand and work from a hook or in this case a steel rod at the top of the stand.

The Netting Stand in use.

Giving a Net Making work shop at the 25th Anniversary of the IGKT in Fareham 2007.

Take care,

Barry ;-)

 

Net Making Tools (p1)

Here are a selection of the tools I have made for net making, Including Mesh Sticks/Gauges, Portable bench or table clamps. and various pieces to make life a little easier. Click on the pictures to see them full size.

Mesh Sticks/Gauges.

I have made many sets of Mesh Sticks in various materials including Wood, Plexi Glass, Steel and Stainless Steel.

Below is my current favorite set of gauges, these are made from a selection of Strainless Steel sheet, recycled Bandsaw blades and Steel crate banding, the four on the left are made from 1.4mm Stainless Steel sheet, the top three on the right are made from the back portion of  bandsaw blades which is 0.9mm thick, the next one down and the bottom one are made from Steel Banding which is 0.63mm thick, with the two remaining made from the 0.9mm bandsaw blade, the length of most of my gauges is 130mm (5") this I find the best and most comfortable size for most uses. the last one in the set is only 75mm (3") long. the widths vary from 6mm up to 53mm in this set and all the corners are rounded.

This next set is made from hard Plexiglass; about 2.7mm thick, this was one of the first sets I made; and it was a chore to shape them as are all are feathered to a fine edge on both faces.

these vary in width from 25 - 65mm  the largest one being 150mm long the rest are 130mm long.

This next set is one from Jann's in the US, I bought a couple of these just to check out what was commercially available.

The gauges are molded from plastic, all the gauges are 150mm long and vary in width from 17-73mm.

the edges of the gauges are rounded but the corners a still pretty square, these are cheap and chearful and great if you don't want to; or can't make your own gauges.

These next gauges are some I made for use during Net Making workshops, these are all made from 0.63mm Steel banding, are 130mm in length and 32mm in width, the blue black colour is from heat treating and can either be left as is; or polished as in the second from last gauge in the picture. this and the last one are 19mm in width.

These next two Mahogany gauges are all that are left from a batch I made as workshop hand outs, off cuts from making my Sailmakers Bench, these are 41mm in width; and are tapered to a thin edge across the whole width.



The last is a set of spare gauges, the first two being rather thick 2mm  Stainless Steel sheet which were a  little heavy to use for any lenth of time. the next few are some of the workshop gauges which have been polished up, some Bandsaw blade gauges, Stainless Steel Strapping, and a guage made from Ash which has an eliptical form across the width.

Portable Bench Clamps.

I made these clamps so that I would be able to make nets or hold work shops any where without having to worry about finding places to attach the net being made.

Here you can see how a  a bag net is attached to the clamp using a swivel attchment and Stainless Steel button. the leather chaffing pieces are slid over the Stainless Steel post and are screwed to the clamp.

Here is a double screwed clamp, this one I now use as the base for my Netted Xmas Tree.

Net Making Buttons.

For want of a better name, these buttons are used by inserting the the button and loop though a grommet starting ring of meshes, and hold the net whilst making a cylindrical bag net, the use of a swivel makes for ease of netting.

A Cast Net Making loop.

This wire loop and adustable length lanyard; I used when making a cast net.

All of the starting meshes are held on the wire loop, which can swivel around as you net, the small cam cleat holds the line at any length, and the lanyard is shortened as the Cast Net body grows in lengh.

More To Follow.



Take care,

Barry ;-)