Hi,I have already spun some yarn to weave with. Mostly i have used homemade spindles and it worked quite well.

 

Now a friendly woodworker made these little beauties for me and I would like to make spindles from them.

My question is about the shaft: what is better thinner or a bit thicker? I can get ready made smooth dowel sticks starting from 5mm ,9mm, 12mm .......?

Any advice will be very welcome.

greetings 

Jeannine

Comments

Sat, 12/18/2010 - 19:43

ruthmacgregor (not verified)

Hi Jeannine,

A 9 mm dowel is very comfortable in the hand, and it's a nice size if you're planning on holding the spindle in your hand as you spin.  It's a good size for people who are just learning to use spindles, too.  ...An 8 mm dowel has the same "comfort" features.

When I make spindles to sell (inexpensive ones!), I use either a 9mm or 8mm size dowel.

A thinner dowel, on the other hand, has the advantage of letting you store more yarn on the spindle before the spindle becomes "full".  You don't want to go very-very thin, because then the shaft will be fragile; but 5mm or bigger should work just fine.

The kind of wood that the doweling is made of will affect the weight of the spindle (which seems obvious, but I sure didn't think much about that until it confronted me!) -- and interestingly, it has a subtle effect on the way the spindle spins, too.  I haven't figured out exactly how that happens (or how to use the information to get what I want), I just know I've seen it.

The whorls your woodworker friend made look great!  How big are they?

Ruth

Sun, 12/19/2010 - 10:09

jeannine (not verified)

thank you,Ruth

The whorls are 5 cm diameter and about 3 cm high. The good man had no clue what i was going to use it for, even though i showed him the prototype my husband made . the prototype was drilled out of pine wood with a tool for cutting holes for pipes. It spins fine but is not quite in balance. the very first one that I made had a big wood bead as whorl. I hope the turned whorls have a better balance. those in the back are beech. the two in front are tropical wood  and they are remarkably heavier then the beech. I will try one of each.The woodworker used what he had on hand as he was demonstrating on the same art market as I did. He said if I had pictures he could make fancier whorls at home but I'll keep that in mind for later. I like to make tools myself. On holiday I spun yarn with a nice round pebble and a thin tree branch and believe it or not it worked but was kind of tedious to wind on the yarn. I just had to prove that this was probably the way spinning has started. 

 

 

 

Sun, 12/19/2010 - 18:20

whiteoakgrandmother (not verified)

Lovely whorls, Jeannine, and I like the basket of spindled yarns. I don't seem to have enough patience for spinning with spindles, though I like to use my Navajo spindle. I usually head straight for a wheel. Ruth, your observations are correct. To understand what is happening and use it to your advantage it might help to visualize it on an exaggerated scale. Tie a bead to a string and swing it around by the string end - then swing by the bead end. You already know what is happening without actually doing it! If the weight is mostly at the center (heavier dowel), it will take more effort to twirl the spindle and it will have less momentum. More weight at the outer edge of the whorl = less effort to spin and more momentum. This is why I've seen some very old spindles that have brass tacks around the outer edges of the whorl. Hope this helps.
Mon, 12/27/2010 - 15:55

Weaverchick007 (not verified)

You might look in the book Respect the Spindle, if you happen to have a copy on hand.  Not sure what page, but there is a chapter early in the book where she goes into the physics of the whorls and shafts of the spindles. 

:-)

~D

Mon, 12/27/2010 - 17:25

jeannine (not verified)

thanks for the advice .I will put the book on my wishlist.