Single Fly Shuttle... Stopping it from flying off.

This is my first experience with a fly shuttle.

I have a single box fly shuttle.  This means that it uses only one shuttle.  There are double and Quad fly boxes available so you can weave with multiple shuttles.  I decided a single would be used the most.

My loom is 40" wide.  I am 5ft 1inch tall and have short arms.  When weaving full width on my HD 36"loom I could not throw the shuttle across easily, so I decided to get a fly shuttle for the 40" loom.  Besides, I wanted to play with one.

It is important that you have the shuttle box even with the shuttle race on the beater so that the shuttle runs smoothly from the race into the box and vice versa.  I am familiar with using an end feed shuttle and love them.  When I switched from a boat shuttle to an end feed shuttle my broken selvedge threads stopped and the selvedge was nice and smooth.  The shuttle for the fly has metal on the tips and is a little heavier than my other EF shuttles.

I was hesitant to use the fly shuttle.  All I could imagine was the shuttle sailing off the loom and through the picture window near the loom.  The first few pulls were too light to get the shuttle from one box to the other.  With a little practice I was doing it well.

With the warp on the loom and thread in the shuttle I started again.  Klunk, the shuttle fell off the right side of the loom and hit the floor.  I got a small rug and put it under the loom to protect the hardwood floor and tried again.  It fell a few more times, I could not figure out what I was doing wrong.

I asked on Warped Weavers on Ravelry.com and Bonnie Inyone suggested turning the shuttle around so that the Honex feeder was toward the reed.  Like magic, it worked.

As I look at it now I understand why.  As you throw the shuttle from the left to the right the thread catches the left selvedge.  This starts to pull the right tip of the shuttle, where the Honex feed was, away from the reed.  When it gets to the metal guide near the right box it hits the outside edge and causes it to fall outside the box to the floor.

When you turn the feed toward the reed it does not pull the tip of the shuttle out and it sails into the box with ease.

One more tip.  Get a good paste wax and wax the shuttle race, fly box and the shuttle.  It reduces the drag and makes using the shuttle easier.  This is something that should be done as routine maintenance.

Using the fly shuttle gives me a very nice selvedge and is quicker than throwing the shuttle.  The only disadvantage is that it does not allow for the use of a floating selvedge.  When using a twill draft I will need to thread a basket weave or plain weave on a couple shafts to get a selvedge without floats along the edge.