Gansey Yarn

 Gansey Yarn is one of the glories of knitting. When knit on thin steel needles, supported in a knitting sheath, it results in a fabric that is remarkably warm, comfortable, and durable. Sorry Love, but no woolen spun yarn can compete.  Woolen sweaters that are as warm and comfortable are not as durable. Woolen sweaters that are as warm and durable are not as comfortable. If you are s shepherd or seaman out in all weather for long periods of time, you want a knit gansey. If you live in a stone hut with a thatched roof warmed by a peat fire, you want a knit gansey. If you have to work (or play) in cold, damp weather, knit fabrics will give more freedom of motion than woven garments. I prefer wool fabrics to most synthetics because the wool is less flammable. 

I tested the good gansey yarns I got from Britain against the good woolen yarns I was getting mostly from Canada, and found the the gansey yarns to be inherently better. More expensive per pound, but they produced warmer, more comfortable objects that lasted much longer.  I used 20 pounds of woolen yarn in testing the relative virtues of  woolen and worsted virtues. Before I stopped testing, I was spinning very good worsted 5-ply, 1,000 yard/pound yarns.  

Spinning gansey yarn was the goal that drove me to buy a spinning wheel in 2006.   Then, it took me 10,000 hours of work and study to learn how to spin useful quantities of gansey yarn. I had to  figure out the traditional tools, make them, and learn to use those tools. I certainly had all kinds of help from folks like Alden Amos, Stephenie Gaustad, Henry Clemes, and Will Taylor. AVL looms showed me how to ply high quality yarn.   By circa 2011, I could spin 560 yards of gansey single in an hour, and make a good hank of  5-ply gansey yarn in a day. In 3 easy days, I could make the 5 hanks of 5-ply gansey yarn needed for a sweater that would fit me. I spun a lot.

The best wools for gansey yarns are long staple and a rather coarse. I use wools with a spin count in the 40s to 55s range. I wash, oil, comb, and plank the wool.  Mostly, I spin wool at ~5,600 ypp (75 wpi, 10s) at ~ 9 tpi. More twist, and the yarn does not "fill" as well making the fabric much less warm.  Less twist and the yarn loses durability and it does not have the density to stop air flow through it and the yarn/ resulting objects are not as warm. Many modern woolen yarns simply do not have the density to stop air flow through the yarn. Woolen yarns that do have the required density tend not to be skin friendly.  Most woolen yarns are warm only in the context of structures with central heat.

Differential Rotation Speed (DRS) set for the desired twist insertion results in a clockwork effect that allows much faster drafting than can be achieved with single drive with either bobbin or flyer lead. This is a concept that modern spinners have forgotten. Their forgetfulness is not my fault.   My job is physics (knowing what works).

Using DRS clockwork, changes in inserted twist can be minimized either by spinning small amounts of  yarn and then winding off or using a flyer whorl with band grooves of differing diameter, and changing the drive band from groove to groove as the effective diameter of the bobbin increases. Depending on what I am spinning, I use the appropriate approach.  I think spinning 7 times faster is worth this little effort.  Using DRS clockwork is the only way I know to spin a good hank of  5-ply gansey yarn in an easy day. 

Spinning /plying a hank of 5-ply yarn in a day, requires tools, skill, and a significant level of fitness.  I consider wool combing to be one of the very best exercises for developing core strength. Then, with knitting sheath and steel needles, I could knit myself a good gansey in a couple of weeks.  Again, knitting fast requires real skill, tools, and a significant level of fitness. When I have been doing a lot of knitting, rock climbers admire my arm and shoulder strength. Only by spending a lot of time spinning and knitting can one have such productivity.

However, we have good reports of professional gansey knitters, knitting a gansey in "a couple of days" and "herring girls" knitting a fancy gansey for a favored fisherman in a couple of weeks while keeping their jobs of cutting fish during the day.  So they were knitting by candle and fire light after working all day. By these standards, I am not much of a knitter.  Likewise, compared to the professional hand spinners of  Florence or Bruges, I am not much of a spinner.

I think the traditional spin twist/ply twist allowed stitch patterns that protected seamen by padding contact with railings, spars and deck on a rolling ship.   Stitch patterns such as Lizard Lattice also provided additional stretch for activities like rowing, while remaining warm and weatherproof.

Yarns like Frangipani are spun for decorative knitting and are spun from finer wools with more twist,  so the stitch patterns "pop" and are more visible. However these yarns have less fill are are not as warm or weatherproof. On the other hand, objects knitting from these wools are more comfortable in modern heated environments.