Posted 28 March 2026 (Sat)
Logs from Obsidian. tl;dr I love Polwarth and this BFL turned out dense as a brick
EEW 6.1 arrived, so I plied the BFL yesterday and got it washed today. Working with the 6.1 was fun (aside from the electric shocks) and it plied up beautifully I think - even though I was worried about the singles being spun unevenly, the yarn itself didn't vary too much in thickness. One bobbin was dramatically shorter, so I made a plying bracelet with the longer of the remaining bobbins, and when that ran out, I chain plied the last (very short) bit of the last bobbin so it's maximum 3ply throughout. I like the gradient and the bits where the plies are different colours. I think I'd really enjoy fractal spinning, so I definitely want to figure out how I can use that yarn.
Before washing, about 10-11 WPI. After washing...well, it hasn't dried, but still about the same. That puts it at between worsted and DK weight, leaning towards the latter.
Length about 95 loops of 178cm (also after washing). Due to using the niddy noddy it was a lot more tidy this time, although because it doesn't have a lot of horizontal width, I had to stack the wraps. Total length calculated to be about 169.1 metres in 113g, likely a little (just slightly) longer. It's pretty dense, unsurprisingly. Mill-spun BFL DK weight is around maybe 225 metres (246 yards) per 100g? I liked the colour changes (even though every time I look at this fibre I wish I got it on a whiter base) as I worked with it, but it sheds like crazy. I didn't even rest this on my table as I was winding it on my niddy noddy and it left some extra tiny fibres. Hoping that washing it got rid of most of the loose fibres, or I'll be suffering through the knitting too.
That said, I don't know what I'd make with it - I thought maybe some kind of amigurumi but I don't know what yet, and I'll have to try and get in most of the colour changes. Whale shark again is an option but 1. I've already made two, 2. it doesn't appear to use enough of the yarn to be worth it, 3. gonna have to think on what yarn I'd be using for the contrast colour there.
I could make a necktie - I have a couple bookmarked:
18.5 micron Merino, 3-ply: 31 wraps
Targhee, 3-ply: 59 wraps
1 round is about 189cm (can't get an accurate measure because my measuring tape isn't long enough but yeah). Better to estimate it a little shorter than longer.
Polwarth, 2-ply: 49 wraps = 92.61m in 19.0g / 487m per 100g
20cm stretches to 22cm, so ratio is 0.91.
Polwarth, 3-ply: a little less than 54 wraps = 102.06m in 31.8g / 321m per 100g
Mixed 3-ply: 26 wraps = 49.14m in 29.2g / 168m per 100g
Finished the 3rd part of the BFL gradient. Realised partway through that the reason I didn't feel too enthusiastic about it (apart from the inconsistent drafting due to predrafting unevenly) was that it felt kind of like the blended fibre that I learnt to spin on...
This section of the gradient came out a fair bit more inconsistently and overspun than the other two because I was kind of rushing it. Hopefully it still has a decent amount of length to make up the gradient, though...
Some updates...
As it doesn't seem like the niddy noddy will arrive in time for me to use it to prepare hanks for washing (won't dry in time, probably) I wound up and washed some of the yarns. It'll likely still arrive by Saturday and I'll use it to get a proper measure of the yarns before I ball them up. It's a lot of yarn and was really tiring to wind with my setup so I didn't want to also go through the 2-ply yarns...I think I'd like to relax a bit and play games too, so I don't think I'll bring the other 2-ply yarns along.
The 4-ply hasn't fully dried yet but just for fun I checked its length and weight...
47cm x 4 = 188cm, 1.5g approximately.
Finished 10g section. This one felt really difficult - kept overtwisting even though I felt it wasn't twisted enough sometimes, lots of spots where it was difficult to draft. Switched back to short forward for a little bit because I found it easier to manage the twist that way. I think excessively fine wool has its own set of problems, which is that it compacts/pills really easily...it's not sticky like Targhee (I think) but feels sensitive to fibres getting crossed and whatnot. Lately I've been thinking Polwarth has the ideal balance of being soft and silky but also not finicky to spin, so if there's anything that I want to be perfect I imagine I'd like it dyed on Polwarth.
Split the BFL gradient braid - I was a bit nervous about it, and kind of worried that I wouldn't be able to split it into 3 sections evenly and maybe I should just do the 2-ply...but I really wanted to see the marling between the plies so I went with it. Couldn't fit it on my more accurate scale so I used the cooking scale. First split into halves - 57g and 58g. Split one into 2/3 and 1/3 sections: 38g and 19g. ...Ok, that's pretty cool. Split the next one. 38g and 20g. Weighed each section again - all 38g. Incredible split, and all I did was split it along a vertical break in the top. The mini braids are very cute. Excited to see the colour changes as I work them...
The only issue is that the 1/3 + 1/3 section isn't quite willing to stick together - I drafted the tips out a bit to see if it'd work and it fluffed up rather nicely, so I think I'll try and uncompact + predraft these ones before working with it. BFL feels coarse compared to what I've been working with lately but maybe I'll enjoy it...the gradient itself feels like it's less defined than I'd like. I thought I'd try spinning from the fold for this to try and make the colour separations more defined, but actually...I don't think it'll work like I thought it would because it's not a blended top, so I guess I'll do it normally.
I'll also need to make sure I only do 2 of these sections first because I haven't got enough bobbins. I still wanted to do a mixed 3-ply spin of all the semisolids, and I need 3 + 1 bobbins to finish that. And then I'd need my EEW 6.1 to arrive before I can ply the entire gradient...
Finished second 20g section, last part was kind of bumpy because of the separated bits.
Didn't keep a close log on what I'd been doing recently, but at this point, I've finished plying and balling up the Targhee, as well as finished spinning/plying the Falkland Merino. Started on the 18.5 micron Merino. All still continuous backward drafting.
On the Targhee - it was weirdly "sticky" when plying, in the sense that the singles coming from the bobbins kept sticking to each other if they touched accidentally. I also had some issues with the 3-ply bunching up, although this only happened towards the end of the 3-ply and I don't know what was causing it.
On the Falkland - I noticed that the areas with more dye seemed to draft somewhat unevenly - it'd often come out in small bunches and/or be a little bit more compacted. Unsure if this is just what happens to dyed wool, but I didn't really notice it happening with the previous wools. In any case, the plying went more smoothly than the Targhee did, and the singles didn't want to stick to each other in the same way.
On the 18.5 micron Merino - it feels...kind of spongy to draft. Unsure how to describe it. The Polwarth in comparison was smooth like butter, and the Corriedale is toothy. I don't dislike it but I feel a little nervous about whether I'm in control because I can't feel the friction as keenly. I'm also unsure if it's just me but I finished spinning a 20g section more quickly than I expected. Drafting across the top was easy, maybe I've figured out how that works.
At the moment, I'm leaning heavily towards using Polwarth. The Merino is nice and soft, but I feel I enjoyed the experience of spinning the Polwarth most. I'll definitely wait until I'm done with the washing and swatching before I decide, though. As for the BFL - I don't expect to be going with this for the project, not that I won't be spinning it up regardless. I think I'd like to wait until my EEW 6.1 is in before I ply that, though. I've also gone and ordered a niddy noddy from Taobao as the cheapest/probably fastest option, because Twin said it's probably better if I want to have it by CNY, and I want to make sure all my yarns are washed and ready to knit before I go and potate in a hotel in Batam this holiday.
Thinking maybe I need a control card that can go finer than what's on the EEW card, because I always seem to be spinning a hair thinner than 40WPI...there are a bunch of worsted/aran weight cardigan/sweater projects I want to do though...
Posted 27 January 2026 (Tue)
Current WIPs. I didn't want to have to wind on hangers again, so right now I'm just taking yarns off my bobbins by balling them up. I asked a friend to 3D print a niddy-noddy for me, but they've been busy so I can't get these finished as I go...
I'm working in the order of Corriedale -> Polwarth -> Targhee -> Falkland Merino -> 18.5 micron Merino -> BFL. All fibres will be worked as 3 bobbins of 20g / 20g / 10g, and then plied as 30g 3-ply and 20g 2-ply. Unfortunately not consistent with the drafting as I found halfway through that I'm more comfortable with continuous backward draw than short forward draw.