PLY article index

This article focuses on the amount of ply twist to aim for based upon the 2/3 method and the 50% method of singles twist. It compares each of those methods as well as the U method. The examples in the article focus on 2-ply yarns but a section discusses 3-ply and beyond. The article finishes with considerations for determining which ply method to use in your yarn based upon the characteristics you want.

The authors discuss their feelings about different styles of kates and how well they work when plying. Beth Smith says, “I’m not against any lazy kate style except one.” Aaron Bush says, “I would rather ply from a homemade shoebox kate than use a built-in lazy kate.” Andrea Mielke Schroer says, “As long as the kate has a tensioning system, we get along fine.

This article offers some guidelines for figuring out which variables in plying matter in a few typical contexts and which variables can be more fuss than they’re worth. It starts with a discussion of what is meant by a mathematically stable yarn and goes into the economics of plying. The author presents an experiment of using the same singles and plying them from 2-ply all the way to 6-ply and comparing the results. Then the author experiments with cable plying and creates several versions of cable-ply yarn with different ply combinations to compare those results.

Carson writes, “Plying can be frustrating, exhausting, and even downright painful for some. Usually if you show me a spinner who doesn’t like plying, I can show you a spinner with tangled singles, a poorly planned work setup, and maybe even rising blood pressure from the stress of it all.” This article discusses some of the ways to set up your plying to help provide less frustration and less strain on your body by talking about kates and tension as well as a section on plying with spindles.

The author describes the journey to spin the longest plied thread possible from 10 grams of fleece to enter a competition for the Bothwell Highland Spin In. The author describes the fiber selection (ultimately choosing a 16-micron Merino fleece) and how she spun the yarn using her e-spinner. Because the singles were so thin and fragile, special care had to be taken in the plying to make sure the tension was not too high, including modifying the bobbin and setting up a kate specific to this project.

This article shares the factors to consider to make sure that you get the plying results in your finished yarn that you want by planning from the beginning. One of the tips is to use one-bobbin sample plying to get a finished yarn to evaluate early on. Photos show how to set up the singles yarn on one hand to create this plied sample, using a method that moves your hand as if you are waving back and forth.

This article describes the fiber chosen and the prep done for the cardigan pattern included in this issue. Readers will meet Luke from the Spoiled Sheep Yarn flock, a white Corriedale/Rambouillet wether who provided the fleece. The article then describes washing/preparing the fleece and dyeing it.

This article describes how to spin the yarn used in the cardigan pattern found in this issue. The fiber is a Corriedale/Rambouillet fleece, and the yarn is a 2-ply DK-weight yarn spun using a short backward draft method.

Crochet pattern for an open front cardigan, sized from S through 5X. The garment is worked from the bottom hem up to the armholes, divided for the armholes, and then the back and front are worked separately. The pattern includes written instructions, the stitch chart, and schematics for the main body and sleeves.

This article describes a method of yarn management when plying 3, 4, or more plies using primary and secondary bobbins, a tensioned curtain rod, and rings. It does take some set-up time, but provides results that are worth that extra time.

This article seeks to answer some of the following questions: Does adding plies to the yarn increase or decrease elasticity and memory? Does a certain ply make the resulting yarn and fabric feel softer or coarser? Is that even a possibility? Are the results uniform over different fiber types, or do different plies do different things for different fibers? The author experiments with Merino and Romney to start providing some answers. The article compares singles yarn, 2-ply, 3-ply, and 4-ply and tests the elasticity of each.

This article seeks to break the “rule” that singles should all be spun in one direction and plied in the opposite and examines different yarns that can be created by spinning singles in opposite directions so that when you ply, you are removing twist from one single and adding twist to another. The article also discusses how to finish the resulting, unbalanced yarn.

Elasticity isn’t something that comes to cotton naturally. This article experiments with the cable-ply structure for cotton to see how it might provide some elasticity to the finished yarn. Along with a normal cable ply, the experiment includes a cable in which the singles have added twist and another in which the 2-ply yarns were slack plied. The article also includes a section on how to manage lively high-twist yarns.

This article examines how ply structure impacts the finished yarn, using 3 types of singles (thick and thin, corespun, and worsted style) plied in three different ways (thread-plied while varying angles from a wavy spiral to a tight supercoil, chain plied, and cabled).

This article takes a small portion of a much larger skirt project (six skirts woven from six different types of wool), a skirt made from Corriedale. The author describes planning for this project and how she approached the spinning, weaving, and patternmaking.

This article describes several plying methods to use for playing with color: successive plying, fractal plying, and cabled plying. It describes using variegated fiber as well as combining variegated with solid fiber. Photos show a number of example yarns which have been knit into swatches.

This article provides some knit, crochet, and weaving pattern suggestions for your yarn with suggestions for appropriate ply structure for each project.

This article describes what chain plying is and how to do it. Photos provide a step by step process.

This article explains how to spin the yarn for the muff pattern included in this issue. The author considers two ply structure options: gimp yarn and a cabled yarn and describes the sampling process. The article then continues with the selected yarn for the outside and inside of the cuff.