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Making New Picker Heels
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The Weaver's Delight is equiped with a fly shuttle mechinism. The "picker" is the leather pad that catches/stops the shuttle at the end of its' travel across the lay or shuttle race. It also pushes the shuttle as it is launched in the other direction.

  The picker is constructed from built up layers of leather. The following pictures show the layers of leather required to make a picker. Leather should be available from tack shops, farm supplies, and hobby and craft stores. There are also leather shops and of course shoe repair shops.

  Make a sturdy templet to use in cutting out or tracing the leather pieces.

  The first picture shows the three different shapes that need to be cut. The piece with the center cut out, "face pocket", allows the "picker face strip" to sink in. This forms a pocket, similar to a catchers mit. There will be three of these pieces.

  The "picker face strip" is about an inch wide, and fits snuggly into the picker face pocket.

  The other pieces make up the bulk of the picker. Making it firm, substancial, and able to hold up to the impact of the fly shuttle inpacting it.

  The second picture shows all the cut out pieces of leather.  The pickers I made are about 1 1/4" thick. With the leather I used, it took a total of seven layers of leather, plus the picker face strip.

  The third picture shows the layers of leather stacked up, before nailing them together.

  The forth picture shows the layers nailed together. I just used some small wire nails. After hammering them through, I used needle nose plyers to bend the tip over, then finished by hammering them down.

  The fifth picture shows the face strip screwed into place. I assume that the face strip is screwed on so that it can be easily replaced when it wears out.

  The sixth picture shows the U-bracket attached to the back. The U-bracket slides down over the top of the picker stick. I made the U-bracket from piece of scrap aluminum.
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