I just built a similar wrapper myself this week. For thread tension I went to the hardware store and bought some fender washers, a piece of 1/4" all thread, wing nuts, nylon spacers 1/4" in diameter and some springs.

I am set up for two spools at once, but I have room to add more. (I see no need at this point, but its nice to have options.) The tension is placed on the spools, which seems superior to the thread itself because there is no chance of fraying the thread with the tensioner. I also used a piece of 1/16" "music wire" as a back tension device. I would try to describe how I put it all together, but I don't think that I can do that very efficiently. I can try to take a pic if that might help.

Basically it was one stop at the local True Value hardware store (I couldn't find everything at the local Lowe's or Home Depot, namely the springs and the "music wire".) I already had the wood laying around, so that didn't factor into the cost. All told I think I spent about $20.


Tyler