Converting a single-drive Ashford Traditional to double-drive

Why?

A double-drive wheel is free-treadling because there's no friction from a brake band. If I take my foot off the treadle now, it will run for many revolutions before it decides to slow down and stop.

As with all Ashford double-drive wheels this one can now be easily switched between double and single-drive modes.

I converted mine in a lunch-break using only a double-drive flyer and whorl (and bobbins of course). There is a little bit of drilling and hammering involved.

If you're interested, I'll be putting together a kit including instructions. In the mean time, it's pretty easy to figure out how to do it and I do stock the double-drive flyer and the bobbins.

I've used a standard flyer here, but you could just as easily use a sliding-hook flyer kit and benefit from the 30% larger bobbins.

Note that if you're buying a new wheel, the double-drive version is only a few pounds more than the single-drive - cheaper than converting it later. But all the extra bits will add complication for a new spinner.

If you're buying a secondhand Trad, the chances are it'll be single-drive because there are so many more of them around.

Ravelympics project (and part of my Fibre-East haul)

The Ravelympics is a knitting and spinning challenge event and start in exactly one week's time. (I believe that there's a sporting event happening at the same time.)

It's officially now had to change its name to Ravellenics for bureaucratic reasons but it'll be Ravelympics to me.

If you've seen this month's Hand Spinning News you will have read me raving about josiekitten's Citron shawl. I was pleased to see the very shawl on show at Fibre East by Marianne of PicPerfic who dyed and supplied the fibre.

I love the pattern and I love the colour graduations (spiral dyed fibre) but I was particularly interested in the fact that she'd knitted with spun singles. This makes the most of the colour changes (although navajo would have achieved this too), it's finer than plied yarn and it gives the finished item a different look and feel. But any inconsistencies in the spinning will be more obvious than with plied yarn.

Much inspired by all of this I decided to make the same for my Ravelympics project.

I arrived early at Fibre East to have the pick of Marianne's fibre. This is the one I chose, called Sliced Denim. It graduates from strong blue to almost white.

I've changed my mind on the pattern because I like the idea of the white going into a lace border. I've chosen Oaklet.

This is it. It has the same stocking stitch body as the citron. I can repeat the lace pattern until the yarn is used up. If I happen to finish the yarn before the end of the repeat, I believe that some pure white will blend in perfectly to finish off with. I love the pointy effect you can achieve at the edge in the blocking.

Fibre East 2012

Thurleigh, Bedford, 14 & 15 July 2012

This was the second Fibre East and it has grown; exhibitors ranged from hobby dyers through to larger names such as Ashford. Spinning was well-represented with Schacht, Kromski, Spinolution as well as Ashford wheels on display.

One of the marquees was designated the 'have a go' tent, offering rugmaking and felting as well as spinning and knitting.

Michael of the Sheer Sheep Experience put on a show which told the story of British wool as well as demonstrating his skills with electric and hand shears.

The Woolsack project has had spinners and knitters, crocheters and felters busy making cushions from British wool as a gift for the athletes competing In London this year. A highlight of the show was seeing a team from the Maldives arriving at the Woolsack stand to choose their cushions.

Another update on the dark raglan

Progress is slow because of my habit for so many things on the go at once, and because I'm spinning a bit, knitting a bit etc.

But I'm almost at the bottom of the body. I'm at the point where I'm starting to measure my own torso and keeping an eye on the work to see when it's long enough. (An advantage of this pattern - you just keep knitting until it's long enough).

It's going well, the cable and braids are really popping out, it all looks good size-wise.

Dressing mixtures

By coincidence but following on beautifully from the last post, I've received a question by email this week about dressing mixture.

If you find spinning easier with a little grease still present but your fleece is very dry after scouring, you can spray it with an oily mixture called dressing mixture.

I notice that Anne Field's original Ashford Book of Spinning (no longer in print) gave three recipes, one of which matches my correspondent's own recipe, that being:

• one part of water, one part of olive oil and a quarter part of ammonia 

She says that the ammonia may not be easy to obtain from your chemist, and this may be the reason that this particular recipe doesn't appear in the current Ashford book of Hand Spinning - it keeps two simpler oil / water recipes.

pour the the liquids into a plant sprayer and shake up well to make an emulsion.

My friend's tips are to spray sparingly and to spray the fleece at least a day before spinning (but note that the mixture may become rancid over a long period of time).

Scouring fleece

With the difficulties I've had obtaining the scour and wash I have been using / selling, it was great to receive these samples in the post from Aussie Know How. As I have been trying them I thought it would be a good idea to write about how to scour a fleece at the same time.

We're aiming to wash and rinse out the dirt and lanolin from the raw fleece without felting it. Therefore agitation has to be kept to a minimum. I like using these net bags (available from your dry-cleaning or pound store) as they make it easier and cleaner to handle the fleece and help you to handle the fleece without rubbing the fibres together too much. Don't pack too much in a bag - the water needs to flow through the fibre.

Carefully place those bags in the hot soapy water. The raw fleece can handle hot water as long as you don't move it around too much and don't transfer it to water of a different temperature. The new product says 20ml per 10litres (that's 2 gallons or one big bucketful). So for my bathful I calculated 80ml, about the same quantity that I'd have used of Power Scour.  I would normally leave to soak for 20 mins, but this product says 'paddle after 5 mins'. I'm not quite sure what that means but the aim is to allow the water to flow around the fibre and carry out the dirt, without allowing the fibres to rub together.

I call this 'sheep soup'. It's amazing what dirt is trapped in the fleece. After this first wash, the instructions suggest using the spin cycle or gently squeeze to take out the dirty water before rinsing. I would generally be more cautious and simply leave to drain on a rack for a few minutes rather than spin or squeeze. These bags then needed two changes of rinse water before the water was running clear. I do use the spin cycle (slow spin) to take out most of the water, with the fleece still in the net bags.

Evaluation of the new Fibre Scour

The essential oils (Tea Tree and Lemon Myrtle - antibacterial) smell very strong but pleasant. I assume that the product contains enough of these to be effective rather than just a token amount.

At suggested concentration, the new product has cleaned the grease more effectively than I expected.  Usually I wash only once in order to take out the dirt and some of the grease leaving a little of the lanolin on the fibres which aids combing and spinning. Now that this fibre has dried (it takes a couple of days to be completely dry) it feels much drier (ie free of grease) than I'd expect. In future I think I will try using a little less product.

[UPDATE] I now have these items (500ml bottles) available at http://handspinner.co.uk/scour_wash_rinse.html

This is my own 'entry' into the Hand Spinning News Spring Competition. I'm exempt of course but still enjoy taking part.

The first picture shows the roving that I chose, in dyed and natural colours, white, natural light, green tea, mint, tangerine and grape jelly.

I blended and spun the neutral colours into one single, and the dyed colours into another single, making sure that a strong colour would always be against a neutral colour.

The colours are very strong and contrasty, but being plied with the white / grey mix has mitigated that. There are three or four yards of each colour before a change to the next, so I feel that I'll have to choose a project with long rows or rounds to really mix those colours up and avoid strong stripes.

With limited time and lots of enjoyable projects on the go, it was tempting to make just a sample quantity of yarn as my contribution towards this competition. 

But I do love the crocus picture (credit to Elenathewise) and I'm pleased that I ended up spinning a quantity that I can use for a real project at some point.