Category: Blog

Here I am, in Las Vegas.

But still daydreaming about the spinning wheel project. 🙂

I’ve been looking at a lot of photos, especially of New Zealand wheels, and I’m really amazed at the creative approaches that various wheelsmiths have taken towards tensioning the driveband.

http://www.nzspinningwheels.info/keneila.jpg

http://www.nzspinningwheels.info/mathieson.jpg

This is really one of the design elements that could make building a wheel fairly woodworking-intensive. Tensioning assemblies that slide up and down with one or more wooden screws are pretty typical for the  traditional Swiss/Austrian lateral treadle wheels.

But I’ve decided that I don’t necessarily want to go traditional.

What I want to do is design a wheel that is fairly easy to build, sturdy, attractive, and very functional.

And I think that the garden-variety bicycle has a lot to offer.

Here are the first pieces of the puzzle:

26 inch bicycle wheel and an old set of handlebars.

Can you see it?

It’s like on of those “magic eye” things.

You have to sit and look at it for a while, then it all comes clear.

Hint: Rotating, not elevating.

I’m thinking that handlebars, acting as the mother-of-all (reshaped a little, perhaps made adjustable in width, to accommodate different fliers), mounted atop the frame of the wheel, could rotate on it’s “neck” (or whatever that piece is called) to tension the driveband.

It is a little big. Maybe I need smaller handlebars. But the shape is right.

Crazy, eh?
We’ll see 🙂

I think a lot about spinning, and spinning wheels.

And lately I’ve been rather consumed by the thought of figuring out what would be my ideal wheel.
There are so many styles and types: modern/traditional, castle/saxony/norwegian/tyrolean, etc, etc, etc.

And it’s not just an issue of style, but also how the form fits the function.

I currently have three wheels: a Kromski Minstrel (Stella), a Pirtle bulky spinner (Hank), and an antique probably Serbian little skewed wheel (Sophie).

Of these three, I’m kind of favoring Sophie these days.

She’s got this great 45 degree angle thing going on between the treadle and the flyer, and with the way I spin, it is pretty much perfect, ergonomically speaking. But she’s just little. About a 15″ wheel. She’s a great traveller, but my perfect home-based wheel would have a larger wheel and would operate at higher ratios.
I’m thinking 24 inches would be about right.

The Stella, my Minstrel has served me well for over 5 years,

and turned out miles and miles of yarn. Lots of things I like about this wheel- double drive/scotch tension, large bobbins, very smooth and quiet, larger wheel than Sophie (18 inches). But lately I find that when I spin on her I’m more comfortable sitting a ways back and off to the side, just using one foot to treadle. It works, but is not ideal.

(Hank, the Pirtle is cool,

but he’s a specialized guy, so he doesn’t really figure in this discussion.)

It was suggested to me by someone who knows a lot about spinning and wheel mechanics that I might want to get a wheel that has the flyer assembly on the right side, because I draft with my right hand forward.

That makes sense, but in a regular Saxony or Norwegian configuration, that would mean having the treadle off to the left. I’ve tried at home to see if I could get used to treadling with just my left foot, and it feels really weird.

But then I saw the answer.
The Swiss Production Wheel.

http://habetrot.typepad.com/habetrot/2006/10/post.html
http://www.ravelry.com/projects/nimrodvern/lafayette-wheel
http://threesheeps.blogspot.com/2010/09/new-weaving-and-old-spinnign.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22356120@N05/sets/72157624881847621/

On these guys, you sit in line with the wheel, flyer pointing off to your left.
Neat, eh?
And since the treadle doesn’t have to go under the wheel,, you don’t need to set the whole thing up on legs, and it is quite compact while still having a larger wheel.

But you don’t see a whole lot of these wheels around. Most are antiques.

My plan- to build one (with the help of The Man, of course)

More on that next week 🙂

Yeah, it’s that time again.
It’s still cold-ish and rainy, but this time of year the boys start thinking of taking off their winter coats and frolicking around in sporty short haircuts.

Now these are the two boys who really need to be tidied up

But it’s always Edgar who is first to volunteer

He was pretty cooperative for a while, but then he got kind of antsy and wanted to go off and scratch an itch or two, so we didn’t get his back end done

His fleece is a little different in color this year- more of a cool, taupe-y shade

Its been a good six months for my buddy Edgar. Fleece is about 3-4 inches long, which should be really good for drum carding.

In other fleecy news, I helped out at the Schoonover Farms spring shearing last Monday- and was rewarded with a lovely shades-of-gray fleece from a Shetland girl named Jennie.

I’m thinking I will sort it into light and dark, spin, and then ply them back together for a ragg-wool type of mottled effect. I’ve done a little sampling already-

Mmmmmmm. Soft. This one is for me.

Was very nice to have a few days away at Cannon Beach:

But it’s always good to get back home

To the critters

And the projects (now done and enroute to Marc!)

And my wool stash

Since I’ve finished the sweater, I’ve gone into garter stitch mode.

Simple, comfy, squishy garter stitch.

For a long time I really didn’t think much of it. Didn’t do anything for me.

But now I’ve come to see its charms.

Rustic, nubbly, lofty, cozy charms.

Worked up in some fuzzy mohair-blend handspun, it might be just the thing to get me through a cold, wet spring.