# Frustrated



## Falls-Acre (May 13, 2009)

I've been trying to spin, I really have, but I'm running into a few roadblocks. I got a couple different kinds of prepped wool roving to try. A blue Merino first (not the first ever, I took a class and spun up a section of grey wool just fine), I spun about 1/4 of the Merino and had to stop. Then magically half that wool disappeared (little fingers may have helped it along). So I got out another bundle, this one a Polworth wool roving in mixed colors. The problem I've had with both of them is the thread keeps breaking! So I thought I'd spin a little faster, but it isn't working. I end up with sections that are overspun, and others that are seriously underspun where it breaks and I lose twist for about a foot (or more) into the spun yarn on the bobbin. I can't seem to keep the draft thickness even with this roving. It just doesn't want to move like it should. Plus the twist keeps getting into the drafting area, making it hard to draft out and even when I can draft, I can only seem to pull out about an inch or two before the strands get too fine and break!

:help:


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## Callieslamb (Feb 27, 2007)

Falls-Acre- I think you have 2nd-try-itis. I did my first spinning almost like a natural spinner. it was sooo exciting. Then the next time I went to the wheel - nothing went right. I found that listening to WIHH was a smart thing. 

Good luck- don't give up.


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

Here are my questions for you  You say you have Roving but is it really Roving? It seems to me that you will rarely see Merino sold as a Roving it is usually sold as Top, or Sliver. These can be very difficult to spin, especially for a beginner. I would recommend trying to spin from the tip of your finger. Pull a section of the fibers out, a section the length of the fibers, probably 4-6 inches. Fold that over your finger and then spin from the tip of that finger. It's easier than it sounds. Or you can pull a length about a foot long and strip it down it's length into thin strips and predraft those. 

Do you have your receipt? Check it and see if it says top or sliver rather than roving.


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## frazzlehead (Aug 23, 2005)

WIHH, you ARE one of the experts now! 

FallsAcre, I find spinning combed top to be very, very tricky. I much prefer a woolen prep for 'easy spinning' - it's a little easier to draft, I find, but then I spin in a slightly different manner than a lot of people do, so that might be part of it.

Your 'draw' will only be an inch or two - that's not surprising. If you are doing a short forward draw (holding the fibre back and then pulling a little tuft forward, letting twist into the tuft and sliding your hand back to pull out another little tuft) you'll only get an inch or so at a time in each tufted pull. That's why it's called inchworm spinning.  It's slow and precise and gives you a nice sturdy yarn ... but it's slow, which is why I hardly ever spin that way. 

Remember that twist flows like water and it gathers in the narrowest spots - so if you've drafted out unevenly, and there is a thick spot and a thin spot, the thin spot will take all the twist, enough that it may break, even though there is a thicker spot there just waiting for more twist to come in. When that happens your best bet is to stop and use both hands to draft out the thick spot so it is thinner - just stop treadling, go tug the two ends of the thick spot to thin it out, then watch the twist go into it and even it out. Start treadling and drafting again and off you go.

If you are doing a backwards draw, pulling your fibre hand back away from the wheel and letting twist come into the fibre to grab what it wants, you do have to be fast. With combed top, this is really, really tricky, too ... I now use a trick called spinning from the fold which allows me to do the backwards draw with combed top, but that's not something you want to try for starters I don't think.  ETA I see this is what Marchwind recommends ... if you want to see a video of the technique, you can look [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D8vaa9TRqk&feature=plcp"]here [/ame]- it's me spinning on the great wheel, but if you look at my hands you can see how I deal with the fibre. This is the only way I can spin prepared top - I can't spin it right off the end of the strip, it goes thick and thin and makes me batty. 

If your fibre is really smooth and fine, try splitting the roving into thinner pieces by pulling it apart lengthwise into narrower strips, then fluffing those narrow strips a bit widthwise and then spinning from those. That will probably help quite a bit.

Don't worry, it all comes with practice! I think I've been spinning for about ten years now, and I'm still learning things!


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## Falls-Acre (May 13, 2009)

Well... I found my missing wool from the first batch. My 2nd daughter apparently thought it would make really cool hair extensions, so she had taken it, sectioned it, then rough-spun it into dread-lock type bits, then clipped it to her hair. I had thought they looked familiar, but she told me she'd bought them. Now I know better!!! She's a young teen, prone to untruths at this age. I'm just glad I found it! And she did save me a little time of sectioning the wool. LOL


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## chamoisee (May 15, 2005)

Try splitting the roving along its length, just pull it apart so that you have to rovings the same length as the first one but half as wide. Then split each of these again, the same way, and try to spin with one of those and see if it's easier.


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## InHisName (Jan 26, 2006)

So check out this girls dreadlocks on Ravelry...
..Ravelry: Dracornasus' Roving Dreads
I was thinking of wearing some to church Sunday- but not sure if they'd go with my grey hair.....
These guys will help you spin- check out www.joyofspinning.com for visual help...
The DVD How I spin really helped me when I was starting to watch someone spin so simply...


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

IHN do it! Blues and greens and just about any color goes with grey. You have to take pictures if you do it


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## Falls-Acre (May 13, 2009)

Will it matter if I change methods mid-spool? I still have to finish spinning the blue and now having started this multi-color wool... in retrospect I had wanted to change the whorl speed, now I'm not sure that is a good idea. Why is it I can spin just fine when another spinner is there, but alone I have tons of trouble?

I'm going to try pulling out a lock-length and spinning from that for the multi (Polworth). The Merino has now been sectioned, thanks to DD2 trying to use it as hair extensions, which actually looked pretty neat, if I hadn't already begun to spin that batch. Honestly I really have no idea how this wool was prepped (top or roving), it was hand-dyed and sold in 3.5-4oz knots, the tags only identified the type of wool used, not the prep type. It looks like roving to me, but then, what do I know really.

PS, the roving dreads on that one page are nearly exactly what my daughter did to my wool... only not quite as tightly worked (thank goodness!). The other link, should that be the joy of _hand_ spinning.com? When I tried the link it didn't work, but a search took me to the other page.


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## frazzlehead (Aug 23, 2005)

Falls-Acre, I wouldn't worry too much about changing methods partway ... you *may* see a difference, but you may not. Do whatever it takes so that you can spin the yarn you want ... change the whorl, change your drafting style, whatever. The difference could be noticeable if you went from say, a super smooth worsted to a mega fluffy woolen, but if you're about halfway, one way to deal with it is to wind off onto a centre pull ball (with a ballwinder!) and then ply both ends together - then one half is one technique, the other half is the other, and then they balance out.  

As for how to tell rovings from top, here's the trick: look at the 'tube' or 'strip' of fibre very closely. Pull on the loose end. When you look at the fibre, is it all "going the same direction", end to end along the strip? That's top. The vast majority of what's out there these days *is* top, even though it's usually sold as rovings. People aren't bothering to distinguish anymore, it seems, which can be very confusing to new spinners (and to people trying to buy online!). If it were rovings, the strip of fibre would look kind of ... messy. If you tug on the end of it, you get a bunch of fibre that's all kinked and curly and going in different directions. Think of it as the difference between my sister's hair and mine: I'm on the left, that's woolen rovings (messy wild) she's on the right, that's combed top. 










(please note this was *her* Master's Degree graduation - I just got to wear the hat for a picture because I helped edit most of her term papers ... that was the reward I requested, one chance to wear The Hat!)


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## Falls-Acre (May 13, 2009)

Epiphany... I think I may know what I did, why I seemed to be able to spin that one bobbin so easily and have been fighting with my wheel ever since. I turned the bobbin around. I didn't really think about it before, but I did. I remember after that one bobbin that when I looked at the instructions, it had said I had the bobbin facing the wrong way, so I flipped it over, and now I'm having nothing but trouble! Flipped the other way the bobbin side is smaller, so the bobbin would have been traveling at a much different speed than the whorl. But I can't rely on that, huh. I need to be able to spin this silly thing facing the correct direction.


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## frazzlehead (Aug 23, 2005)

What kind of wheel is this, again? Can you post a picture of your bobbin?

Is it double drive or single drive? 

(Sorry a bazillion questions but need to know to know what to suggest!)


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## lathermaker (May 7, 2010)

Also, roving does have a direction. Take your index finger and thumb and run along the length of it going one direction. If you end up with fiber gathering up behind your finger, that is the WRONG direction. Turn the roving around and spin from the other end. I think you need to do more pre-drafting also. It sounds like you're struggling to get the roving to draft out.


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## Falls-Acre (May 13, 2009)

It's an Ashford Traditional, I'm using it in double drive form. The bobbins are setup to be used interchangeably for double or single drive. It's okay though, I think I have it figured out. I spun 1/4 of the knot of multi. That's generally about all I can handle at one time before my hands give out. I couldn't do the over-the-hand drafting technique, it just wasn't working for me. However, I did pull the fiber into single lock lengths, then split those in half and spun from that. It was a short-draw (all I can manage at this point), and the wool ended up going in multiple directions, but I did it! It's not a perfect single, but it is relatively even, moderately fine, and the twist doesn't seem to be over or under (for the most part).

Of course there are spots where everything I just said is a total lie, and I literally had to knot it together at one point (that was where it was just starting to come together and had slipped off the cup hook and wrapped around the shaft of the flyer). I'll take some pics of the resulting single tomorrow. Hopefully this trend will continue. The multiple colors of the wool are giving a very interesting result since some of the colors intertwined.


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

With the Traddy the bobbins are on either right or wrong I think what it did was changed your tension. If flipping the bobbin works great! Otherwise moving the MOA up or down/forward backward should do it too. But as Frazzle said at this point it doesnt really matter do whatever works for you. Right now you are learning. Think of this and maybe the next couple of bobbins as samplers


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## frazzlehead (Aug 23, 2005)

Hey, Falls-Acre, MizMary posted this awesome picture of combed top ... so I thought I'd share it here, too!










*That* is combed top. See how it all goes in one direction? All smooth? But notice the label says "roving" - they don't distinguish anymore, all prepped fibre in a long strand is called roving these days. But this is what top looks like.

Woolen prep rovings are way wilder.  I'll try and post a picture for you tomorrow - I happen to have a rather substantial quantity of it here, we stock it at Flannelberry Creek.


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

I found two really good pictures, one of roving and one of top. I don't know if I'll be able to post them here but I'll try.
This is Roving. If you look closely at the fiber structure you can see how each individual fiber is going it a different direction. It's a mess, but a lovely mess.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/marchie/7534502504/in/photostream/

This is a Top. look closely at it and see how the individual fiber are all aligned with each other. Now compare the two pictures and really look at the difference. I fear it is as Frazzle says, sellers are calling everything roving
http://www.flickr.com/photos/marchie/7534502736/in/photostream/

It seems counter intuitive that the messy fiber would be easier to spin but they are.


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## Marchwind (May 10, 2002)

Well you will have to click on the links. Now I'm having problems posting photos over here


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## frazzlehead (Aug 23, 2005)

Here's another picture of rovings - this is the stuff from our mill in Alberta, a truly woolen prep.










ETA: YIKES! Hugeness!

Well, I guess you can REALLY see the detail!


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## Falls-Acre (May 13, 2009)

Wow! There seems to be an enormous difference between the 2 prep types, but this stuff doesn't really look like either. I'll try and take a few pics tomorrow, it's probably top though.


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## Miz Mary (Feb 15, 2003)

I did what Chamoisee suggested , you can see it in that photo on the bottom right .... I divided the strip lengthwise ... then did it 2 more time !!! Spin that and it will draft great !!!


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