What is a Power Loom?
A loom is a tool used for weaving yarn into textiles. There are many types of looms, including the hand loom, frame loom, and shuttle loom. A power loom, yet another type of loom, is a mechanized tool that uses a drive shaft for power. Invented by Edmund Cartwright in Great Britain in 1784, the power loom allowed manufacturers to create textiles much more quickly than with hand-driven looms. This improvement helped the power loom become one of the defining machines of the industrial revolution. A loom works by holding lengthwise threads, called the warp, under tension. The vertically-oriented threads are attached to two or more harnesses which move up and down, separating warp threads from each other and creating a space called the shed. Another thread, called the weft, is wound onto spools called bobbins, which are placed in a shuttle and passed through the shed, which creates the weave. In the early 20th century, the shuttleless loom, also known as the rapier loom, was invented. This
