I also love promoting other spinners web sites. One of the first ones of real value that I
found (and all you others don’t think your site is no value, I may have just
not found you at the time), is Tulasi Zimmer’s site “The Joy of Handspinning” (http://joyofhandspinning.com/). Tulasi has a wonderful way of explaining
things in the most simple terms and with just the right number of pictures to
assist. Her explanation on how to roll
rolags was the only one that made sense to me and I finally got the hang of it. (And Angora rabbits are definitely part of my
retirement plan ;-)
There are many brands and types of hand cards on the
market. I just happen to have Ashford
ones but nearly all the wheel manufacturers also make hand cards. Essentially hand cards are a flat or curved
paddle with carding cloth attached. It
is possible to make your own hand cards if you have skills in that area,
although I have found it a little challenging to source carding cloth in
Australia.
Teachers and experienced spinners may tell you that there
are carders for various purposes. The
downside is that when you are starting out you may not be able to buy tools for
all occasions and really when you are starting out there is no need to. (Remember there are no spinning police here.)
You can card most anything on a basic set of hand cards but
be flexible with the results if you are trying this with specialties. Fibres like cotton card better on finer
carding cloth, as does angora (rabbit), ox, possum, silk roving, milk silk and
various other fine fibres. That’s not to
say it can’t be done, just the results are a little less smooth the further
apart the tines on the cloth are.
I only have one set of hand cards and they do everything for
me.
My assumptions about
hand cards?
I overloaded them at first.
The more you put on the quicker you are going to be able to process this
fleece right? WRONG!! You just end up with a matted mess and lots of neps if
you load too much on the hand cards.
(Neps are those little balls of fibre.
Sort of like pills in a finished fabric.)
Load just enough to not clearly be able to see the
tines. Most people find it better to use
washed wool. Trying to process unwashed
wool will leave your hand cards sticky with lanolin and over time they get
grubby so that when you want to process something fine or expensive you need to
overhaul your hand cards back to a presentable state (and that may not be easy). I’m not saying it can’t be done but most
spinners will advise against using hand cards for unwashed wool. Or at least if that is what you want to do,
have a second set just for the nice clean fibre.
I also thought that I would get smooth roving from my hand
cards. Well I haven’t yet. If I start with roving and am blending it,
then yes the results are nice, aligned and smooth. Processing a washed fleece does not get the
same results. Although I haven’t yet
tried cutting the tips of the wool off yet.
(yes this is suggested by some!)
Perhaps my results are a little less than what I expected as
I didn’t really understand these tools when I first got them. But I think we all learn best from trial and
error. My hand carding is slowly getting
better as I observe more of what I am doing and learn to adjust my technique to
observe different results.
But what do I use my
hand cards for?
I initially thought I could use them in the house by my
wheel in place of the Wild Carder. Well
the results there were yes and no.
Rule 1 of spinning in my house.... ALWAYS have an old sheet
or table cloth under your work area.
Even mill washed roving deposits dust and debris under where you are
working. At least with some sort of
covering over the floor you can take it outside and give it a shake between
having to vacuum after every spinning session.
So I carded to make rolags.
I blended to make coloured rolags.
I used my hand cards to prepare small samples of fibre or colour
blends. I came to the conclusion that my
hand cards are a tool with their own purpose.
They don’t replace my carding machine, my flicker brush or hand combs.
Some spinners appear to do most their processing on hand
cards. But I am looking for variety in
technique and from a health and safety view that is also good. Hand cards are a different action to carding
machines, combs and flickers. And,
variety of action is good for us.
A handy tip... If you ever go to a show to buy fleece, pop
your hand cards in your bag. I find
being able to card a few locks of a fleece will give you a better idea of how
it will handle when you take it home to spin it.
So where to now?
With spinning being an ancient craft, developed in different
ways, and with different fibres around the globe there is much information to
be found and much to be learnt. In this
modern technical age we can and should learn much about our chosen craft. I have included an extra link to the Ashford
clip on hand carding, but time and a suitable internet data allowance will
allow you to find many many more resources.
I know Wikipedia often gets a bad rap for being unreliable
but their page on Carding is
pretty informative for those of you who like a little history and technical
info, to supplement the practical “how to” type info. The post covers all sorts of carding and has
some informative links at the bottom if you would like to read further.
So experiment and spin happy.
No comments:
Post a Comment