Schiffli storage media

Traditionally Schiffli designs are stored on Jacquard cards of which there are two types – Plauen and Saurer. Named after Joseph M Jacquard, inventor of the Jacquard loom, Jacquard cards contain a stitch-by-stitch interpretation of the design together with machine functions, exactly as the embroidery machine will read it, encoded as a series of holes. The Schiffli machine uses a mechanical controller or ‘Automat’ to decode the pattern of holes into frame movements and functions – tension, speed changes, borer actions, etc.

More recently, the embroidery industry has used paper tape as a recording media. Thus Jacquard card electronic encoding produces a ‘tape file’ which is essentially an electronic image of the card. ES Schiffli outputs two tape file formats – T10 (for Plauen) and T15 (for Saurer). As the newer Schiffli machines can read floppy disks, there are various Schiffli machine floppy disk formats. You therefore need to convert the basic tape file to the required disk format.

Experienced Schiffli digitizers can read the Plauen or Saurer type tapes and even make modifications to them. The FIXPAT program which comes with ES Schiffli provides the same functionality. This utility displays the design in card format (T10 or T15) just as the punched holes would appear. In this way you can visually check certain parts of the design. Furthermore, the program provides search capabilities to find and change machine functions or insert new ones.