BRAIDS includes information on the following topics:

Until I get all of the pages entered and links hooked up the items listed above maybe out of order and have to be accessed sequentially.
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Andean  Braiding

Below is a sample of 16 strand Andean Up braiding.  The loop on the end is 8 strand Andean then the two ends are brought together and the 16 strand Andean is continued.



Start with eight strands and knot them at one end.  Locate the position two inches towards the knot end from the center and place a rubber band around the eight strands at that location.   Hold the eight strands in your left hand formed as a fist with the thumb up and the knot end down and the rubber band inside the closed fist.

Lay the strands in groups of two each, with two going north, two going south, two going east and two going west.   At the start of the braid the meaning of UPPER and LOWER will not mean anything since it will not be apparent, but as the braiding proceeds it will become apparent. To start off we will just use the terms LEFT and RIGHT as viewed by the person braiding. The terms FRONT and BACK will mean back is away from your body and front will be closest to your body.

Two strands will be  picked up with the first, middle and thumb of the right hand. With the fingers of the right hand are pointing to the left, grasp the LEFT_FRONT STRAND and pinch it between the middle and first finger and then grasp the LEFT _BACK  STRAND and pinch it between the first finger and the thumb. The right hand is then rotated so the palm goes from facing to the left to facing down or CCW (counter clockwise). The twisted pair is moved to the BACK of the left hand and placed under and held down with the little finger on the left hand.

With the fingers of the right hand are pointing to the right, grasp the RIGHT_BACK STRAND and pinch it between the middle and first finger and then grasp the RIGHT_FRONT STRAND and pinch it between the first finger and the thumb. The right hand is then rotated so the palm goes from facing to the right to facing down or CW (clockwise). The twisted pair is moved to the FRONT of the left hand and placed under and held down with the ring finger on the left hand.

Given the preliminary descriptions of how to manipulate the braiding, I will establish some shorthand notation that will make it simpler to describe the movements for Z and S techniques and for sixteen-strand braiding.



Refering  to the figure above: 
First letter indicates front or back
Second letter is left or right
Third letter is lower or Upper

For eight strand braiding (left side figure) there is only one set per side so the left /right designation is dropped.

The ARROW indicates the first strands to start with and the direction they should rotate. The up arrow indicates counterclock wise rotation and a down arrow implies clockwise rotation. The rotation starts as indicated by the arrow and alternates direction as the strands are twisted moving from left to right.

The remaining strands are held down along the side of the braiding while the first set of strands are twisted then while holding them down the strands from along the sides are selected and moved up. The whole assembly is rotated 90 degrees (direction is not important as long as the direction of rotation REMAINS THE SAME for all the braiding).

Repeat the above process using the next set of strands and holding the previous strands down alongside of the braiding.

The braiding that starts with the CCW (counter clockwise) rotation will produce Z twist braiding and for the S twist braiding the rotation must start with a CW (clockwise) rotation. 

Having the information above we know that the eight strand braiding  we prevoously started  will  be  Z twist braiding.  Continue the eight strand braidding  until you have completed three inches of the braiding then secure the braiding with another rubber band around it .
Next you will bring the other eight strands up and lay them so that there are four strands  per compass direction,  4 pointing North, 4 pointing South ,4 pointing East and 4 pointing West.   It will be necessary to untie the knot that was intially placed in the end of the eight strands.  The loop formed with the eight strand braiding will be placed downward into the closed fist of the left hand with the weavers exitting by the thumb and first finger.  The four east strands and four west strands will be held placed along side of the loop to start.  To continue with the z twist braiding the process will be to use the diagram above right, with the exception that the arrow should be shown pointing from the fll to the blU indicators. So you would start with the (front-left-lower) strand and the (back-left-UPPER) strand and you would rotate them to the CCW and place them at the back under the little finger.   Next select the (front-left-UPPER) strand and the (back left lower) strand  and rotate them in a CW manner and place them in the front under the ring finger tip. Now pickup the (front-right-lower) strand  and the (back-right-UPPER) strand and rotate them in the CCW direction and place them to the back under the middle finger.   Fianlly pick up the (front-right UPPER) strand and the (back-right-lower) strand and rotate them in a CW direction and place them in the front under the middle finger tip.   Reach in from the sides and grasp the east and west strands and bring tnem up along the sides of the strands just crossed over and while holding the crossed strands down between the east west strands and the top of the braiding release your left hand fist and rotate the whole group 90 degrees so that the old east-west group take up the location where the north-south strands were and vise versa.  The direction of rotation does not matter as long as it is always the same each time the strands are rotated.

I know this sounds difficult, so spend some time to get it straight in your mind and then it will be simple and second nature to you. By varying the colors of the strands  will produce amazing patterns. I prefer to use three colors but experiment . I recommend that you start out by making eight strand braiding until you perfect the technique.  There is a good book on this topic which is  
"Sling Braiding of the Andes" by  Adele Cahlander it is a paperback book published by Weavers Journal  with ISBN: 0937452033 . It is an expensive if you can find it but she does give an good explaintion of this and other techniques in her book.
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Turks Head Knots raised from basic foundation knots

Many TurksHead Knots (THK) can be produced by first tying one of  three basic foundation knots, which are the 2pX3b, 3pX2b, and the 3pX4b THK. Adding additional turns or  AB crossovers will increase the number of bights and  by using a method called laying the tracks and using a "mule" the  THK can be EXPANDED to produce a variety of larger knots. Once you gain experience in tying THK the need to use the mule can be eliminated.

All of the larger knots (in this tutorial) which have an EVEN number of parts will begin with the 2pX3b THK as a foundation knot and all the larger knots that have and ODD number of parts will have a foundation knot that is either 3pX2b or 3pX4b.

The number of times the foundation has to be raised depends ONLY upon the number of parts!  Subtract the number of parts in the foundation knot  from the number of parts in the desired knot and divide that result  by 2 and the answer is the number of times you need to increase the foundation knot. 

 As to the number of extra turns or AB crossovers needed to get to a specific number of bights, that number is the bightsdesired minus the  bightsStart plus the parts in the foundation knot take all of that and divide it by the partsDesired  and then subtract one. 

All that information is to remaind me about the mathmatics involved but I have generated a table that allows you to EASILY choose the final topology and see what the required foundation knot is and to determine how many extra turns or AB crossovers are needed and how many times the foundation knot has to be raised. The table is presented below and covers many of the knots that are tied in hand.

                                                                  PARTS

Following the blue line diagonally from right to left you see that you  encounter the 3pX2b foundation  three (3) times before you reach the far right side.  This is the number of times the knot will have to be raised. 

Continuing to follow the blue line upward you move only once (1) time before reaching the top most occurance of the 3pX2b foundation.  This is the number of AB crossovers that will be needed. 

To summarize the 3pX2b foundation is first given an AB crossover which increases the knot to a 3pX5b. Next using the "mule" the knot is raised from the 3pX5b to a 5pX9b,  the process is repeated again and the knot becomes a 7pX13b and finally the process is repeated for the final time which raises the knot to a 9pX17b THK

There are some good sites that discuss the use of the mule and increasing the dimensions of THs.   Until I have added the photos and discusssions of those techniques here I would direct you to the following websites for some good examples of how to increase THs.

The Alaska Museum of Fancy Knots website  has a good tutorial on how to make  Nantucket Sailor's Bracelets which demeonstrates the use of the mule on both odd and even part THs and a discussion of AB crossovers. 
   
A tutorial by Bud Brewer on the KHWW website called Nantucket Mat    demonstrates how to increase a TH by performing an AB crossover  and without using the mule.

Since there is a signifigant amount of information on the table above which contains ALL of the information about "EVEN" and "ODD" part THs on the same chart , I have made a separate table for each type .  

The color of the diagonal lines indicates which side of the Standing Part (SP) that the Working End (WE) should take when starting to lay down the tracks.  The mule will split the tracks and will assist you to determine whether to pass over or under the next bight.   Of course the WE changes to the other side of the SP as it makes the down pass and then reverts back to the original side on the next up pass if applicable. 

The diagonal lines represent the INCREASES in the number of leads from a 2 lead  to a 10 lead for the EVEN part TH knots and from a 3 lead to a 9 lead for the ODD part TH knots.

The column to the left of column2 for EVEN PART THs and vertical column3 for ODD PART THs  shows how many initial bights (loops) have to be tied before doing any expansion.    Each time the same foundations typ2 is encounterd  as you move up in column 2 or 3   represents another loop for 2pX3b THs or another AB crossover for the 3part THs..

The table below is for EVEN PART THs and the starting point for these expansions will be the  2pX3b TH  which is a simple overhand knot where the WE is brought up next to the SP. 

NOTICE:  If the 2pX3b is expanded by taking the WE to the left of the SP, a 4pX5b TH will result, however if you expand by taking the WE to the right of the SP the resulting TH will be 4pX7b !!!!!!!

For ODD PART THs  the starting point for the expansions will be either the  3pX2b TH  or the 3pX4b TH.  The diagrams below show the 3pX2b and 3pX4b starting  knot topologies as wll as a diagram of how to perform an AB crossover.

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Turks Head Knots using Pins and a Former

If you set two rows of pins into and at the sides of a  board or at the sides of a  tubular form and assign the pins numbers such that the pin numbers are same on the left as they are on the right, then all you have to do is to determine the number of BIGHTS you want and you will have to insert the same number of pins on each side  of the form as there are bights.  To determine how to tie the Turkshead you will start at Pin 1 and attach the end of the cord to pin 1.  In order to determine which pin the cord should go around will be determined from the number of leads or parts. 

 THE RULE :  is to take the number of LEADS and subtract 2, then divide that answer in half and that is the number of pins to skip over. 

                        P= (Leads -2)*(1/2)

 What to do if the number does not come out a WHOLE NUMBER (you know it has a remainder)???           (This WILL happen for all ODD part TH's !!!)
That is easy just forget about the remainder and skip the WHOLE NUMBER of pins on the leftthand side BUT on the righthand side you will skip the WHOLE NUMBER PLUS ONE more. Thats all there is to it. 

When you are counting up you will have to stay in  modulo(BIGHTS) arithmatic but that will not be a problem because you will only have the same number of pins as there are bights so you will automatically have to go back to pin 1 when you reach the last bight.  We will show how this works with an example.

EXAMPLE  7pX6b TH 
Begin by finding the number of pins to be skipped
 (7-2)/2 =2.5  then WHOLE NUMBER is  2  
and so the number of pins to SKIP on the left will be Pl = 2
and  the number of pins to SKIP on the right will be Pr= Pl+1 = 2+1 =3 

Starting with the lower pin1 (our righthand side) we skip two so we have
1 + 2 +1 = 4  so this is pin4 on the lefthand side (our topside)  from there we go to 4+3+1 =8 - 6 =2.  This pin2 on the bottom side.  Notice since we went higher than the number of bights we sutracted that number from our total to bring us to the proper location. Continuing on we start with pin 2  so
2+2+1 =         pin5  top                  5+3+1=9-6=   pin3  bottom               
3+2+1=          pin6  top                  6+3+1=10-6= pin4  bottom                    
4+2+1= 7-6= pin1  top                  1+3+1=           pin5  bottom               
5+2+1= 8-6= pin2  top                  2+3+1 =          pin6  bottom                 
6+2+1=9-6=  pin3  top                  3+3+1 =7-6=  pin1  bottom               


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Flat TH  Mats Cordage Length Calculator

The Flat TH Cordage Calculator computes the cordage lengths for  Turks head and Multistrand circular mats  and also generates a KNOT TEMPLATE  which can be followed when tying the knot and a MAT TEMPLATE (that  can be printed).   Below is a picture of the calculator



Shown below is a view of one of the templates the Mat Template can generate.


The calculator may be  borrowed for evaluation   (like checking a book out of the library).  

                              Simply click  Mat Calculator    

To purchase your own registered calculator visit Knotworkn Market       

After the file  downloads to your computer press RUN then RUN again and when the registration page  comes up then press the START button.

I have not personally tested this calculator against  many of the mats that are possible. since I personally prefer the cyclindrical form but I developed this calculator as a tool for the many folks that do tie TH mats  at the request of Gordon Perry. 
I put it here for people to use and to evaluate it.  I have a feedback form on my home page and would appreciate any comments that you are willing to provide especially if they could be used to improve the calculator.
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Single Strand  8 plait braiding

An example of single strand 8 plait braiding is shown in the picture below. 

 To braid a single strand eight plait grommet obtain at least seven feet (210 cm) of cordage and locate the center.  At the center form a circle of roughly 3 inches (7.5cm) diameter taking cordage from both halves equally.  Begin to form a grommet by making four turns around the starting loop with each of the free ends being sure to keep the lay of the grommet correct.


The pictures above show the first two strands of the grommet. 

Shown below  are the third and fourth strands of the grommet laid up




The next steps show how to interlock the cordage and to start the interweave of the grommet. 

The strand coming from the right passes to the left of the leftmost strand and then turns back towards the right crossing in front of the leftmost strand and over ONE additional strand and then passes UNDER itself and the additional strand.  

The leftmost strand after passing to the right of the rightmost strand then turns towards the left passing OVER the rightmost strand and then immediately passing UNDER the TWO strands that were not passed under by the rightmost strand.  This is the same as passing OVER the same two strands that the rightmost strand passed under.

The picture on the left below shows this process clearly .    The photo on the right below shows the same information as the photo to the left but additionally shows how to interweave the strands in order to make the plait.



Each cordage end is woven over TWO then under TWO.  The weaving should pass over and then under the SAME two strands each time. Continue the weaving on around until the area where the cordage first interlocked.


The figure above shows the weaving pattern as the strands pass through the initial interlock for the first time.  The weaving sequence is always the same over 2 then under two.




In the photos above the over 2 under 2 can easily be seen. The awl is pushed under the two strands that need to be passed under and the two strands between the awl  and the working end  are  the two strands that are to be passed over. The interweaving tends to spiral around the grommets as the weaving progresses.


The lobes of the interweaving are apparent in the photo above with three sets of  lobes then a space  followed by another set of three lobes a space and so on .  At this point  all but the last sequence of weaving has been completed.  The rightmost strand has made  two complete rotations of interweaving and so must the leftmost strand so that with the four strands from the grommet and the four fron the interweave we get an eight strand plait.



The photo above shows the end of the interweave and the strands meet at the same location passing under two strands.  All that is required is to go back through and adjust the tension and remove any slack from the plait.


At this point the ends can be lashed and clipped or they can be fed up through the plait and tied into a two strand Matthew Walker knot or a diamond knot.

Below are some  examples of single strand eight plait knots.



This is a collection of the first three knots of the Periodic Table of Knots formed using single strand 8 plaiting.  The knots are connected together using Spanish Ring knots. 

The Periodic Table of Knots is shown below and is one of those items that I do not know from whom I received the photo.


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