[HN Gopher] Vanishing Culture: Punch Card Knitting
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Vanishing Culture: Punch Card Knitting
Author : HieronymusBosch
Score : 85 points
Date : 2025-02-12 12:11 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.archive.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.archive.org)
| sondr3 wrote:
| I recently bought an old Brother knitting machine (KH940) which
| is electronic but with a community of hackers adding third-party
| firmware and hardware on it [0]. There are also lots of models
| that read punch cards [1] and knit that purely mechanically (and
| later models electronically). They are a marvel of engineering
| that has essentially died out, only Silver Reed and Taitexma
| produce new models as far as I'm aware and they are often not as
| featureful as the old machines (SR has no garter carriages that
| Brother machines had 40 years ago for example).
|
| [0]: http://www.ayab-knitting.com/ [1]:
| https://alessandrina.com/2015/09/03/brother-kms-punchcards-a...
| yapyap wrote:
| Electronic knitting for the consumer-ish, that's awesome!
| trescenzi wrote:
| I'm a knitter who's been considering doing something like this
| for some time. Thank you for these links. That second one seems
| like a great jumping off point for this whole world.
| WillAdams wrote:
| A while back, Lee Valley had a 3D knitted chisel roll available
| for purchase, which I've always regretted not buying --- any
| idea on who might have made that or where to get now?
|
| https://www.leevalley.com/en-gb/shop/tools/workshop/storage/...
|
| I somehow doubt Dieter Schmid will have it in week 21 of this
| year....
| world2vec wrote:
| My mom worked at a jeans factory in Switzerland, in the early
| 80s. Apparently they used some sort of punch cards to create
| certain patterns in the trousers (flowers and stuff like that).
|
| Very interesting article, will ask her if they looked like those.
| alnwlsn wrote:
| A long time ago, I remember hearing about some castle or manor
| house or something like that which was being restored. There was
| a set of custom rugs, which, while intact, were badly faded.
| Somehow, they still had the original set of punch cards on hand
| that ran the looms, and though the machines were long gone, they
| were able to figure out the pattern and have a complete new set
| of rugs made, 100+ years later.
| fritzo wrote:
| Sounds like a contender for the longest-ever lasting digital
| backup.
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| I would contend that it's more like a printout, or recompile
| from source, because of all-new materials...
|
| https://xkcd.com/1683/
|
| It's unsurprising too, if you consider that buildings almost
| always have their blueprints and designs on file with the
| government, and stored somewhere. The wealthy may have a
| "keep it all together and shove it in the attic" mindset; in
| 2002 I picked up a Macintosh Plus at a garage sale, and it
| was packaged fully functional, with accessories, cables,
| Print Shop, Golf, Flight Simulator, etc., all manuals,
| receipts from the store, and an article clipping about this
| new up-and-coming software company with Bill Gates at the
| helm.
| HeyLaughingBoy wrote:
| I started my career sitting in front of a PC running
| XYWrite, next to a MacPaint manual that I was supposed to
| copy for our MacPaint clone. "Just change enough text so it
| doesn't look like we copied it..."
|
| And yet, I have never actually used an Apple product except
| for an in-house test application running on an iPhone.
| bunderbunder wrote:
| My local public library owns a computerized version of one of
| these, and I've been itching for a chance to use it for a full-
| scale project.
|
| That said, based on my small amount of experimenting with it, I
| have to say I'm not surprised that the home models are hard to
| find anymore. They're a relic of a bygone era when home knitting
| was a means to an end, so having a tool to help you get to a
| specific practical outcome much more quickly was something a lot
| of people would be interested in already. And that, in turn,
| creates an opportunity to make products for the subset of that
| subset of people who still want to make it fancy.
|
| But most knitters nowadays do it because they enjoy the physical
| process of knitting by hand. So tools like this arguably defeat
| the purpose of the hobby for a lot of people. The only person
| I've met who had any interest in actually owning one (instead of
| getting to play with someone else's, as I want to do) was a
| visual artist who happened to use textile as one of her media.
|
| And now, in the Internet age, there are online services such
| Wildemasche that will do custom jacquard knits for you. Just
| upload a file with your pattern and they'll take care of the
| rest.
| marbro wrote:
| I'd like a custom blanket made with alpaca or a blend of alpaca
| and wool but haven't found it.
| enos_feedler wrote:
| This was the first programmable machine I was ever introduced to
| and set me on a course to learn programming and get deeper into
| computers. In the 4th grade I was given a chance to be pulled out
| of class for a week and visit the local high school and a teacher
| demo'ed this machine. Super cool!
| shreddit wrote:
| And here am I who wonders of what use a knitted punchcard would
| be...
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