Numbers

When  did people start using numbers?

Neanderthal pursued a number of advanced tool making  activities for a very long time, then interbred with modern humans to produce fertile progeny (definition of same species).

see for example :  http://anthrojournal.com/issue/october-2011/article/neanderthal-cognitive-ability-and-technological-development

These kinds of technical activities require planning; and, planning requires numeric competence.  Understanding this connection requires thinking and deduction.

Our ancestors were counting when they were still making stone tools and wearing skins rather than spinning and weaving.  Our ancestors were counting 150,000 years ago, and possibly 250,000 years ago.  The opening paragraphs in many texts on origins of human numeric competence are silly.  

Even if you studied anthropology a long, long time ago, Google is your friend.

Great Wheels

Making yarn is about inserting twist into fiber.  Twist is energy. The essence of making yarn is using energy to organize fiber.  And, energy for twist  has traditionally been the largest single cost for a mill making natural fiber yarns.

With a great wheel, if the spinner wishes to work very efficiently, the  spinner will turn the wheel rather slowly so that most of the energy goes into twisting the yarn, and very little braking is required. However, this produces yarn slowly.  A motivated spinner spins the wheel rapidly so twist is inserted quickly, but then the wheel must be braked and stopped before the yarn over twists.

Braking and stopping the wheel wastes the energy already added to the wheel, and the braking/stopping process requires additional energy from the spinner.

Spinning yarn on a great wheel is energetically very inefficient.

A great wheel is like an old Ferrari - it goes very fast, but it uses a lot gas.

In contrast, a  flyer /bobbin assembly does not have to be stopped and CAN be  energetically  more efficient.  Note, the single drive flier-lead assemblies do require continuous braking, which wastes energy.. With flier-lead there is an adjustable brake band device (Scotch Tension) and with bobbin lead, the braking usually comes from the aerodynamic drag of the flyer (Irish Tension, sometimes with an additional brake band on the flyer).

A double drive flyer /bobbin assembly designed to insert twist as required for the desired grist does not require any braking. These are the energetically, the most efficient spinning wheels. 

In a double drive flyer /bobbin assembly not designed to insert twist as required for the desired grist, one loop of the drive band will act as a brake. Because such systems require drive belt slip, their energetic efficiency is noticeably LESS than a single drive  flyer /bobbin assembly. Thus, a few  millimeters difference in a whorl diameter can dramatically change the energetic efficiency of a double drive flyer/bobbin assembly for the production of a particular grist.

That said, if great quantities of thick woolen singles are wanted in continuous lengths, then a great wheel may well be the tool of choice because it offers the leverage to spin those big copps.  If  I want to produce an 1,800 yd cuts  of 3,000 ypp singles on my wheel, I have to splice short ones into long ones.   On the other hand,  if we are spinning 23,000 ypp, then 1,800 yards is only a little over an ounce, and I do not have to splice at all.  On my wheel, spinning fresh rolags, (from the drum carder), 1,800 yd of  woolen 23,000 ypp is about 6 hours work.

Folks with great wheels should let us know how fast they spin  23,000 ypp singles on their great wheel.  I do not seem to have any GW production numbers for that grist.  In theory , it should depend on the motivation and fitness of the spinner, and a spinner willing to put in a lot of  energy should be able to do it very fast indeed.

My Knitting Pins

In the last couple of years I have made myself a full set of blunt ended knitting pins.   At this point, I have decided that I do not need the "pointies" any more and have packed them up and  . . . . .

At this juncture, I knit with steel knitting pins that flex and  curved steel "pricks" that rotate in the knitting sheath.  The pricks are better for small objects such as gloves and socks, while the pins are better for large objects.


This is everything that I think I need to knit anything I want to knit from any yarn I want to knit:

 The whole kit

  18 " long Gansey needles in 2 mm and 2.3 mm

(not shown are 8 more in WIP)

A few favorite knitting sheaths and a crochet hook

B--> T; 1.3 mm pins and pricks, 1 mm pins, 1.5 mm pins and swaving pricks

 B--> T; 2 mm swaving pricks & clew, 2 mm pins, 2.3 mm swaving pricks and notions, 2.3 mm pins

Many of these needles/pricks have been used for 300,000 stitches. Prototypes were used here in the house, and prototype needles got trips to the shop until I had needles that worked the way I wanted them to work.  Mostly the pins cost me between $0.10 and $0.60 each to make.  I have the tools and skills to make them quickly and accurately. So I can afford to have what I think is just the right needles for the project.  My knitting tool selection is not limited to what is available at LYS, Stitches, TNNA or even the internet. Thus,  the problem is deciding what IS the right needle or pin.  

The criteria are:

1. Must work for yarn between 850 and 2,000 ypp.
2. Must allow fast knitting with minimum stress on hands/wrists.
3. Must produce very uniform fabric.
4. Must allow production of dense fabric.
5. Must be very durable.

The needles and knitting sheaths that I use are the best compromise on the above criteria that I have ever seen, heard about, or read about. It took me about 2 years to switch from circular needles to DPN/ knitting sheaths.  It has taken me about 2 years to switch from pointy needles to blunt pins. When I find something better, I will move to something better.

A needle for every yarn

I started with pointed needles because EVERYONE said that is how one knits.  I started with hand hand-held needles because that was how everyone knit.

Then, there was this hint that old knitters used long needles, and I tried that, and it did not work

Except there was this hint in Mary Thomas that in the old days, when everyone did knit, they used knitting sheaths. and it turned out that yes, a knitting sheath did tame the long needles.

Much experimentation resulted in the discovery that long (pointy) steel  needles with diameter of ~2.25 mm really did produce lovely fabrics from soft worsted weight and firm sport weight yarns.  And the spring constant of that size of music wire allowed a spring action that allowed fast knitting.

I experimented with finer needles, right down to 0.5 mm, but never got that nice combination of  wonderful fabric and fast knitting. Thus, I spent several years knitting mostly with pointy US 1 size needles and sport weight to worsted weight yarns ( 1,000 ypp to 850 ypp).  It was not so bad, the combination produced a class of fabrics very well  suited to many of the outdoor activities that I like.

A couple of years ago, I had some splitty sport weight yarn and tried knitting it with blunt size UK 13 needles.  It worked very well. Then, I made blunt ~2 mm needles for knitting softer spun sport weight. The result was better than I expected.  First, it was clear that the knitting motion was smaller, so even the reduced spring constant of the thinner needle could produce more stitches per minute.  So while the stitches were smaller, the actual area of fabric knit per unit time was similar.  I had found a way to knit fabrics that I liked on finer needles at a reasonable rate.

More recently, have been making and experimenting with blunt needles in the sizes of  1.3 mm and 1.5 mm.  These produce nice warm, firm fabrics from 3-ply and 6-strand "sock yarns" in the 1700 ypp range.  And, the knitting motion is so small that it can be performed very fast, resulting in reasonable production rates.  Counter intuitively, I can knit much faster with flat tipped needles than with pointy needles. Adopting flat ended needles seems to be the last technical requirement to knitting Jerseys and Sheringham ganseys.  I had produced samples of the fabric before, but it was always as a tour de force, and it was never as a convenient and practical fabric. The effort of making such fabrics on pointy needles was too high to make such fabrics practical.

Flat tipped, flexible steel needles allows me to knit large objects from the same fine, dense fabric that I had previously only been able to reasonably produce in smaller objects such as gloves and socks by swaving.

Belaying "pin" for sail boats. 

Shear  "pin"

Taper "pin"

Yes, "knitting pins" included blunt rods and wires.  These days I have knitting pins with blunt or flat ends in sizes from 1.3 mm to 2.38 mm and in lengths from 10 to 18 inches.  They are an old school tool for making old school fabrics.  I make them all of spring steel from the local hardware store.  I find that a knitting sheath works better than a Shetland knitting pouch for blunt tipped knitting pins.

Blunt points work well on cable crosses and  bobbles. If it works for nice bobbles, it will work for nupps etc. It is a different technique, but the equipment works.

SWMBO

She, who thinks she is SWMBO, says: "No pix, then it did not happen".

She is critical of all that I do.  It is time to, point to the lack of photographs on her page as evidence that she does not have the technical expertise to judge my work.  Hoist by her own petard!

Photos are important, if one is making objects whose sole purpose is decorative. My sister is a goldsmith, and she has staff whose primary duties include photographing and maintaining the archive of thousands and thousands of photographs that comprise her full portfolio. People buy jewelry on the basis of how it looks.

I knit socks for my friends, and NONE of them care how the socks look.  They care about how the socks function. (And, if the socks function perfectly they will have a very attractive functional aesthetic.)  If you are putting a lot of effort into how your socks look, then you are putting less effort into how your socks function. I finish the socks and hand them over and they wear them for a while. Then, they tell me how well the socks functioned.  I think about it for a while, and try to make better socks.

My materials, patterns, and tools change, not just to be different, but to make better objects. When, I think I am making the most functional objects possible, then I will start trying to make them "prettier".

Handspun is just one approach to better objects.  At this point, it is clear that the best objects from hand spun yarn can be much warmer and more durable than objects from mill spun.

5,600 ypp singles, on hand, that have not been allocated 

to any particular project.

All-in-all there is about 70,000 yards of singles there.

(The purple yarn with knitting in front is 6-strand, 1680 ypp sock yarn 

on 1.65 mm needles for scale. I am testing its functionality as sock yarn. The yarn is nice, 

but is it worth all the effort?)

It took me about 3 years to be able to tell by touch and feel whether a particular fabric was warm, or just looked warm.  Knit wool fools the eye!  I do not think anyone can reliably make that judgement from a photograph - not even from a high resolution picture, and certainly not from an internet resolution pix.  On the other hand, it is easy to make the judgement from a numeric description of the fabric, such as fiber, twist and grist of the singles, ply structure, and gauge for a knit fabric. Numbers can tell us clearly and precisely how warm the fabric is.  If you do not know the numbers, then you do not know how warm the fabric is.  (Numbers were developed in the days when "spinning" was used to make cord to hold stone tools on handles to kill animals so the skins could be used for garments.)

Numbers can name and convey information about textiles that cannot be conveyed by pix.  If you know textiles, you know what a 65 meter/gram worsted thread is, and you do not need a pix. ( e.g., Suffolk fleece spun at its spin count, the traditional single for hosiery yarns.)  If you do not know the difference between a 65 meter/gram worsted thread and a 65 meter/gram woolen thread, then a pix is not going to convey that information. (The woolen yarn will require more twist to hold it together.)

One way or another, the way to convey detailed information about yarns and fabric structure is with numbers.  If one cannot understand the numbers and do the math, then one cannot understand yarns and fabric.

A spinner controls the process.  A spinner sets a budget - how long a piece of yarn will be spun from a given amount of fiber.  The spinner sets the budget on how much twist will be inserted to hold the yarn together. It is the spinner who determines grist and twist.  If the spinner is very good, the twist and grist will be determined very precisely and produced accurately. The only way to name any aspect of these processes very precisely is with numbers.  That is, every competent spinner names their yarns with numbers.   Then, competent weavers and knitters know the precise nature of that yarn. And, competent spinners who understand the numbers for their yarns, understand the yarn produced by other spinners that name their yarns with numbers e.g., meters/gram or yards per pound or hanks per pound.

I do not care if you speak English, Hungarian or Chinese, you can not discuss yarn and fabric in precise detail without using numbers. Numbers describe yarns and fabrics more precisely than pictures.  It may also be necessary to have a picture, but for the essential character of the yarn, a picture will not be as precise.  And, better spinners need more precision.

By-the-bye, naming yarns by number also allows budgeting time. I know how fast my wheel runs, and I know how much twist is in 5,600 ypp worsted singles so I know that it takes me a little under 175 hours to spin 100,000 yards of 5,600 ypp worsted, and that I will use ~18 pounds of fiber. Allowing time to block hanks rather than simply winding onto bobbins or pirns, it is an easy month of spinning.  And, it is enough yarn for 2.5 months of knitting or 2 weeks of weaving.

Jealousy and Delusion

"Wow! You make an awful lot of assumptions about me, Aaron. You clearly have a very active, if completely inaccurate, imagination. I don't need a wheel like yours. I outgrew my Ashford Traditional years ago and moved onto different wheels with features that allowed me to spin faster and more consistent yarns. I do have an accelerated wheel - it's a Great Wheel - but I wouldn't build a wheel like yours for love nor money. It would be superfluous.

If the finished product is nothing, as you say, then you're going to be very, very cold in your non-existent gansey because there will be no finished product to wear. I hope you can stitch your numerous samples into a blanket, because it seems that you will have nothing else to wear unless you take a trip to Neimann Marcus."

The above is a comment from a reader. Let us see what we can deduce from it.

There are no measurements, numbers, or objective criteria anywhere in the comment.  Thus, this is a person that does not do objective quality control, engineering, science, or math. She says she spins faster.  I can spin and ply 560 yards of worsted spun, 5-ply sport weight in less than 7 hours. That is more than 3,000 yards of  5,600 ypp worsted singles and 560 yards of plying in less than 7 hours. I can do it anywhere, any time. I can do it in front of a judge and jury if you want. Knit on 2 mm long needles with a knitting sheath it makes a lovely, light, warm garment.  It is remarkably durable, and can be worn around the campfire without any fear of sparks burning a hole in it.

Now, how long does it take my reader to spin a good hank of "gansey yarn", and has she posted any pix of it? She has one standard for me, and a very different standard for herself. Do we see rulers on her blog/web pages? My educated guess is that she can spin woolen @3,000 ypp at a rate of under 300 yards per hour on her great wheel, and spin worsted at @3,000 ypp at a rate of under 100 yards per hour.

And she says she spins more consistent. The last pound of 10s (worsted spun hanks of 560 yards at  5,600 ypp ) that I spun were all within 5% of the desired weight of  45.4 grams. Can my reader spin skeins of singles that are consistently within 5% of the desired grist?  I think not.

So not only do I spin much faster, I likely spin more consistently.  This is because I do understand objective quality control, engineering, science, and math.  I report testable results.  She claims vague fantasies.

I have half a dozen very good ganseys that I have knit from various yarns over the years.  Some of these are from hand spun.  I have knit hundreds of socks over the years.  Socks, that I knit were worn on over 300 man days of  downhill skiing this year, and it was low snow year. (e.g., my socks are worn by several, dedicated skiers, some of whom would have to be classed as "powder hounds".)  If I put my friends off, and stop knitting for them, I can knit a good gansey in less than 10 days. I have enough 5-ply on hand for several sweaters and I have plenty of singles (5,600 ypp) spun for the loom that can be re-tasked, and plied for knitting yarn.  Knitting a gansey to a conventional design is trivial.

The hard part, the interesting part, is finding better textile designs, and better technologies to produce the designs.  Spinning is easy.  Spinning fine is harder.  Finding a better way to consistently spin fine and fast is very hard.  Knitting is easy. Finding a way to knit better is hard.  My reader is clearly not interested in finding a better ways of producing textiles by hand.  This blog was started to record my search for finding ways to hand knit warmer fabrics.  After I had advanced knitting, I needed warmer yarns, so I added the search for how to hand spin warmer yarns to the blog.  More recently, I realized that I had erred in my interpretation of knitting sheath technology and blunt or flat tips on needles used with knitting sheaths result in faster and better knitting.

Lots of people write about pretty knitting and pretty spinning.  There is no need for me to write about pretty.  I write about warm and durable. These days, many write vague fantasies about warm and durable hand spun and hand knit objects, but very, very few have done objective quality control on the objects/fabrics that they write about.

We cannot say that my reader is "stuck in the past", because the professional hand spinners and hand knitters of  the past (e.g, 16th century)  were very, very good.  And, since I do not own anything that was ever purchased at Neimann-Marcus, she is not very well informed and does not read carefully.

I really do not care how anyone knits or spins or how fast they do it.  I merely point out that there are options. I point out that one can ALWAYS seek to spin and knit faster and better.

ECS 3

A swatch/prototype in progress.  The stitch is eastern crossed stitch.  The yarn is Paton's Classic Wool.  The gauge is 8 stitches per inch or 32 stitches per 4".  The object is the torso for a knit in the round Jersey.

This object is out of my bin of ECS WIP.  Today, I knit the same stitch at the same gauge - I just knit it at a practical rate. The fabric is lovely.  Now, I know how to finish it off in a reasonable time.  The scale is marked in inches. 

ECS 2

After some additional swatching, and reflection, I expect that eastern cross stitch was the stitch used in the classic "Jersey" shirts produced in the Channel Islands for seamen and fishermen.  Perhaps ECS was also used in the heavier Guernsey shirts, but it makes a glorious fabric for general outdoor wear.

Eighty years ago we could buy knit wool sport shirts! Today, they have been replaced by knit cotton and polyester.  And while I love my knit cotton rugby shirts, when cotton (and linen) are wet, the are not nearly as warm as a knit wool.  And, knit synthetics are not safe around open flames.  No, knit wool is the right fabric for working and playing away from central heat.  And, ECS is the best stitch that I know for finely knit shirt fabrics.

And eastern cross stitch produces a warmer and more weatherproof (keeps out wind and wet) fabric than modern Weldon's stockinette.  (Knit with hand held, pointy needles)  At the very least, there are many little stitches in a finely knit shirt, and Weldon's methods are a lot of effort for a few stitches.

I do not expect anyone to accept anything that I say.  I expect everyone to THINK and test everything.  Swatch, and test heat flow though the fabrics. Swatch, and stitch the swatches into garments and test how they perform.  I expect my students to be adventurous and creative.  I expect my students to never accept the current technology as the end point.  If you are EVER satisfied with the current technology (spinning, knitting, weaving) then you do not belong here.

Our current hand made textiles are not as fine or produced as quickly as the hand made textiles of times past. That proves that we do not need power equipment to work faster.  That proves that we do not need computers to work better.  We can do better than we are doing by improving our skills and refining our tools.  It is not easy, but my students are not lazy.  If you think it is too much work, you do not belong here.

Eastern Cross stitch

My attention was originally drawn to Eastern Cross Stitch when I read in Mary Thomas's  Knitting Book, that in previous times, it had been a very popular stitch. This raised the question, "What was  Eastern Cross Stitch's particular virtue to make it popular?"

Yes it produces a nice firm fabric, but so does stockinette when knit with fine needles and a knitting sheath.

However, with flat tipped needles (and a knitting sheath), Eastern Cross Stitch turns out to be the fastest stitch to knit. (Or at least the fastest I have found so far.)   The hand movements are few and tiny. They can be done quickly and with minimal effort.   In hand knitting, fast is cheap.  Fabrics knit with Eastern Cross Stitch had the lowest cost to knit.  And, it produces a warmer fabric using larger needles (fewer stitches per inch^2).

I played with ECS on pointy needles a while back, and knitting it was more effort than knitting stockinette so I have bins full of ECS WIP.    Now, I know how to finish them quickly and easily. Knitting ECS with pointy hand held needles is also more effort than stockinette.  I actually expect that at one time ECS knit in the round would have been considered "stockinette".  Consider for example the stitch structure of the Coptic socks.

Eastern Cross Stitch has rather abruptly become my default stitch for firm fabrics. (Pending  full testing of the prototypes.)   It was just a matter of finding the right tools to make the stitch faster and easier.

This of course raises the question as to whether the Channel Island knitters used the ECS as a competitive advantage in knitting seaman's clothing.  In any case, it is easy to see why the stitch was popular.  And, it lends credence to the old stories of very fast knitting. (e.g., even faster than :

Am I an "Elite" knitter?

When I knit the stuff that everyone else was knitting, I never considered myself an elite knitter.

Now, I knit stuff that some (or even many of my readers) do not believe can be knit.
I use tools that almost no other knitters use.  These allow me to hand knit fast.

I have knit a dozen pair of good ski boot socks so far this year. The socks from commercial 5-ply sport weight gansey yarn were knit at 8.5 spi, and socks from 6-strand 2x3 cabled 850 ypp  worsted were knit at 7 spi.   We like these yarns for cold weather boot socks. A pair of these socks is some where between 20,000 and 30,000 stitches - about the same as an adult sweater knit at 4 spi.  However, because the fabric is much tighter, the effort to knit is much greater.  On the other hand, 3 or 4 pairs of those snow socks is about the same number of stitches and the same effort as a good gansey from commercial 5-ply.   This spring, I also did some knitting of my own 5-ply, 1,000 ypp yarns, on 2 mm needles@ 10 spi,  but that is a different post.

Socks that are felted down to size tend to keep shrinking under the heat and friction of back country skiing.  Worsted yarns, knit tightly to fit, do not shrink.  These socks can be washed, and put on wet, and in a very few minutes they will feel dry and warm. (Or, they can be machine washed and tossed in a cool dryer. Start with swatches!!)   This does not occur with more loosely knit socks, which must be fully (and very gently) dried prior to being comfortable to wear.  For years, I hiked with a pair of socks dangling and drying on the back of my pack. (Sometimes commercial, and sometimes my hand knit.)   Now that I have learned to knit tighter,  I can wash my socks and put them on wet. That means I only need to take one pair of socks.

It is not necessary for you to believe for the technology to work.  In fact, if you do not believe it, then I am the ultimate Elite Knitter.  The more that you do not believe, the more astonishing my knitting. The more astonishing my knitting, the more I must be  the ultimate Elite Knitter.  To demote me, you must show that everyone can knit a couple pairs of good, tight snow socks per month.

Pure Wisdom

He, that I call "Pure Wisdom" is a member of my most extended family.  He was one of the brightest stars at one of the world's most technical companies, and now is one of its most senior managers. He is no longer concerned with technical issues because he says, "Old must be BOLD!"

We are, after all, are writing our Epitaph. We are writing our grave stone.  Writing in stone takes great force.  Yes, we need to be very bold.

There are many manuals for writing resumes, but there are few guides to writing good Epitaphs.

One was laid out by Ina Corina Brown in the course she taught as a Peabody Scholar.  Sometimes it was offered as a set of things to do on a regular basis, and sometimes it was offered as a personal performance test.  Here is one of the test versions.

1.     Do I seek to to achieve personal growth and development by means of some plan whereby I can enlarge my horizons as well as fill gaps in my knowledge an experience?

2.     Do I subscribe to or regularly access:

2.1.  Some reliable news media? 

2.2.  Some quality magazines dealing with current thought?

2.3.  Some magazines devoted at least in part to book reviews and literary criticism?

2.4.   First rate professional journals?

3.     Do I read at least 2 dozen serious books in the field of biography, history, current affairs, and literature (including classics read and reread)?

4.     Do I make some serious effort in increase my understanding and appreciation of art, literature, and music through the use of pictures, lectures, concerts, records, plays, books and the selective use of radio, TV, and Utube ?

5.     Do I follow some consistent plan for building a library, including dictionaries, atlases, encyclopedias, religious texts, and reference books such as Bartlett's Quotations, Fowler's English Usage, and more modern texts on the topic?

6.     Do I have some consistent plan for professional reading, and for professional growth and development?

7.     Do I have an interest in, and an awareness of, the world of nature so that I can identify and enjoy birds, flowers, trees, stars, and landscapes?

8.     Do I have some enriching and relaxing hobby or interest such as weaving, wood or leather working, cabinet making, book binding or gardening?

9.     Do I belong to and actively participate in at least 3 of the following:

9.1.  A religious body?

9.2.  A civic group?

9.3.  A political group?

9.4.  A literary, art or music group?

9.5.  A scientific group?

9.6.  A social action group?

9.7.  A professional society?

10.  Do I have some consistent and orderly plan for budgeting and handling my income so that:

10.1.  I am able to meet my obligations promptly?

10.2.   Get the greatest possible benefit form my income?

10.3.     Make reasonable provision for the future?

11.   Do I have some consistent can orderly plan for budgeting my time so that I can:

11.1.   Meet my personal and professional obligations?

11.2.    Render service to my fellowmen?

11.3.     Have time for enriching leisure?

12.  Do I take care of my health through habits of eating and sleeping, judicious use of exercise and rest, and regular physical examinations including eyes and teeth?

13.  Am I particular in habits of personal cleanliness and grooming, and in selection, care and repair of clothing?

14.  Do I fulfill my obligation as a citizen by:

14.1.   Voting regularly and as intelligently as possible?

14.2.    Civic participation (serving on boards and committees, aiding in Red Cross and other drives and etc.?

14.3.  Some regular volunteer service to an organization engaged in community betterment?

15.  Am I careful in my oral and written speech habits including enunciation, pronunciation, vocabulary and sentence structure, and do I attempt to correct known deficiencies?

16.  Do I practice the kind of good manners that come of a thoughtful awareness and  consideration of others?

17.  Have I honestly attempted to achieve those qualities of character that I most genuinely admire such as integrity, fortitude, compassion, tolerance?

18.  Do I make a persistent effort to rub off the rough edges of my personality and to become a friendly,  likable person who brings out the best in others?

19.  Am I continuously enlarging the horizons of my knowledge, interest and concern so as to become in the best sense of the word, a citizen of the world?

20.  Am I honestly trying to develop what Overstreet calls “The Mature Mind”, so that I may grow up before I grow old?

See for example http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-41198-154456/unrestricted/chap6.pdf

I transcribed the above from a hard copy, and I know there are some typos in it, but in accordance with "make it work, then make it pretty"  I offer it up in its current state.

The other thing that I would add is that there is a lot of sloppy thinking out there.  Sometimes details matter. And, when details matter, generalities fail. When someone tells you that woolen spun is warmer than worsted because woolen is looser and holds more air, ask yourself if they have the details correct. 

Spinning, knitting, and waving are all technologies where details matter - a lot.  And, yet I find that many modern hobby spinners, knitters, and weavers tend to gloss technical details.  They pretend to want to spin or knit or weave fast, but avoid the tools that would allow them to work faster.

Thus, the  4 additional questions that I would add to ICB's exam are:

21. Am I honest with myself about my goals?

22. Do I test statements asserted by others as facts?

23. Do I keep my math sharp?

24. Do expand and deepen my knowledge of physical science? 

Testing statements is not looking them up at some citation. It is either calculations from first principles, or going into the lab or studio, making the test equipment or preparing the test material and testing it. If you want to know whether I am telling the truth about what kind of fabrics are warmer, knit up some fabric swatches and test their insulation values.  If you want to know if I am correct about knitting sheaths, make one and try it.  Try it with pointy needles, then try it with blunt needles.  I did.   

By reading the classics, we learn, "Trust, but verify!"

Speculation from Ignorance

Recently, I have been seeing a lot of Speculation from Ignorance about my knitting. It is derogatory. What drives them to slander and libel me?

Do they really think that when somebody spends 15 years working out how to make knit objects that are just the way he likes them, that he is going to come up with crap?  No, in 15 years one can learn how to make the best possible objects.

Are the sexist? Who cares? This is likely a deeper emotion. They are lazy, and they want fast gratification.

They do not want folks talking about fine needles producing fine knitting.

If they want to produce knitting as good as mine, they need to use needles as fine as mine. They do not want to put in the effort required by fine needles. They want to be elite knitters, but they do not want to put in the effort required for fine knitting. Thus, they want to shut me up as fast as possible.

 
I was in the LYS today, and a lady was talking (with awe) about the fine hand knitting produced on 3 mm needles during the 1920s. As she was speaking, I was knitting 2,000 ypp, 3x2 cabled yarn on 1.75 mm (flat ended) needles at 14 spi. It is a nice fabric.  In is a finer fabric than can be produced on most of the needles that most modern knitters use.  I am not saying anything against those fabrics knit quickly on fat needles, I am saying that the fabrics that I produce on finer needles have particular virtues. Once you get into the rhythm of the process, it goes pretty fast.  After 15 years, I can say that I am approaching fine knitting.

Look at the old Izod polo shirts.  They were finely knit wool.  I can remember when there were finely knit wool rugby shirts.  The term "shirt" traditionally included finely knit wool.

Knit wear supporting a pool of water

Here is a 5 year old pix of some knit wear including a sweater supporting a pool of water.

It was 12 oz cup about 2/3 full, so that is about 8 oz of water pooled on that sweater.

And yes, the cement was dry when I picked the sweaters up.

Try it with your sweaters!.  Then, make a knitting sheath; get, or make some gansey needles, and  knit a good tight swatch.  Wash it, oil it with lanolin, block it/ dry it.  Then, try pouring water on your swatch.  The water will pool on it.  Another test is to face a bright window, and hold the fabric about an inch from your eye.  If you cannot distinguish the edge of the window, then (if oiled) water will pool on the fabric and the fabric will keep you warm.

Left to right the yarns were Winghams gansey, MacAusland, and the old LB Fisherman's Wool.  The socks and balaclava were knit from MacAusland.  All of those fabrics will hold a pool of water.  The  6-strand sock yarn that I use these days produces a fabric that feels softer, but is even more weatherproof.

A competent knitter can make a functional knitting sheath in half an hour. (Functional, not pretty!)  A competent knitter can make a set of needles from music wire from the local hardware store.  Use a firmly spun yarn, and in a long afternoon, you can prove to yourself that knitting with a knitting sheath will produce fabrics that cannot be reasonably knit with hand held needles.  Yes, such fabrics can be knit with only hand held needles, but it is very slow and hard on the wrists. Been there, done that, which is why I went looking for a better way. With a knitting sheath, knitting such fabrics is fast and easy.

Anybody with an interest will try the technique.  It works.  Anybody that does not try, is not really interested. I do not have time for people that are not interested.

For the folks that are interested, I have time to give pointers and tips on how to make better knitting sheaths, better needles, and develop better technique.

Boot socks knit n 2015, each supporting a nice pool of water.  In some places water has run off sideways, but each sock is holding a pool of water- e.g., the water is not draining down through the fabric.  Nevertheless, these socks all allow water vapor to pass though them, allowing the feet to dry.

Flat tipped needles 2

These days, I make knitting needles by cutting steel music wire to length, grinding the ends flat or slightly domed, and polishing the burrs off the edge. Pix of the needles I have been using (in the Redwoods).

Needles in the range of  2 - 2.4 mm. The cross section of the ends is round.

The 2 knitting sheaths that went with me to the Redwoods.

 A worn and machine washed (in hot water) "swatch".  (This yarn is NOT labeled as washable!!) The yarn is a  3x2 cabled yarn that I am using for all my hiking socks this year.  RIW got 12" high socks of this design/yarn and used them for a dozen days of skiing last winter.  He tells me that they work as well as the Shetland yarns I had been using for his ski socks.

A swatch as it comes off the needles - these anklets I wear on the Nordic track.  I like the pointed toe to cushion my toes.

The belt I wore over my swimming trunks to hold my knitting sheath.  (It came with some cheap shorts from Costco.)  It does not work very well for pointed needles with a knitting sheath - (they need more support, e.g., a leather belt), but it works well enough with flat ended needles.  Flat tipped needles really do simplify the whole knitting sheath concept.   

I do not suggest that flat tipped needles work very well for hand hand knitting.  Ball tipped needles work OK hand knitting soft woolen fabrics, but pointy really is better for hand held knitting.

short sleeved Shetland

A nice beam reach home,  made more interesting by fracturing the main sheet fitting.  It was cool and breezy.

The gansey was short sleeved to allow reaching into the water to set lines on trolling weights, but it works for all kinds of play on the water. It is not pretty, but it does what it does very well.

I knit things that I think will be useful and comfortable.  And,I test them.  I make sure that the techniques I use produce objects that are useful and comfortable

Flat tipped needles work with leather knitting pouches

I was wrong.  Flat tipped needles work very well with Shetland knitting pouches for ordinary knitting, purling, and decreases.

Since the motions are smaller, the knitting is faster and less effort.  As I get more comfortable knitting with flat tipped needles, the process gets faster.  My original estimates of 10%- 15% likely understate the speed advantage of flat tipped needles.

Also the knitting sheath needle adapters are much easier to make for cylindrical needles, and they work much better. As a system, flat tipped needles with knitting sheaths is simpler and works better.

Using a Journeyman knitting pouch with US#1 flat tipped needles did not seem to cause any delay in inserting the needle into the pouch. This was very much a surprise as I had expected that the point of the needle was essential to quickly inserting the needle into the knitting pouch.

At this point, I see pointy knitting needles as only for hand held knitting techniques.

At this point, I guess that with a Shetland knitting pouch and flat tipped needles, all of the stitches used in traditional Shetland lace of the Victorian period can be produced with flat tipped needles.  I have not tested this, and will have to get out my old lace patterns and see if it is true.

The silver spoon

You go into history, and find times and places where a the number of professional spinners can be associated in some way with a definite quantity of wool being spun; or cloth being produced. From that one can calculate ( See AA for the math) the productivity of the spinners.   From that one can estimate what technology the spinners were using. There are many times and places were we have such data (of varying quality). The problem is not finding the data, the problem is understanding that the data can be used to calculate spinner productivity.

Then, plot spinner productivity against geographic location and time. Varying data quality ensures that these are noisy curves.

Transitions that might be visible in such curves would include drop spindle => driven spindle, adoption of single drive flyer/bobbin assemblies for plying, and adoption of  "DRS" double drive technology. Given the quality of the data, I do not see clear evidence of the first 2 anywhere, anytime. However there seems to be an abrupt increase in spinner productivity on the European continent in the 14th century.

Then, wool and textiles were a more profitable industry, and over the 15th century England moved forward with enclosure and the 1489 Act.  England saw that textiles could be more profitable and England wanted more of the business.

To get there, one needs to understand that "DRS" double drive technology increases the productivity of a spinner producing worsted spun warp by a factor of 4.  Some readers have not kept up with the material and  have not yet internalized this point. (Or, being voracious readers, they would have already done the calculations and noticed the trends.)  I am reminded of  organic chemistry, when keeping up with the material required 40 or 50 hours of hands on chemistry in the lab every week.  DRS also requires hands on studio work every week.

Today very few hand spinners use DRS double drive technology, and thus modern hand spinners miss just how powerful a technology it is.  When spinning woolen, DRS is only about 50% faster than a single drive system, but when spinning worsted it is 400% faster. DRS allows a completely different drafting technique, that is not taught in spinning classes because nobody has DRS wheels that allow the use of such technique.  It allows me to spin in one day, what other modern spinners will spend the whole week spinning.

I like worsted spun knitting yarns and I like to spin my own warm.  The effort required to become proficient with DRS is one of the best investments I have ever made.  It did not come in a silver spoon or a workshop at Black Sheep. It came by diligently thinking and working.

And, until I can find somebody to make the spinning wheels, it is not something I can teach in a workshop.

Lyme Disease

If you think I am harsh on the conventional wisdom of spinners, wait until I get going on the American Medical community.

Lyme Disease has been around since the Bronze Age, but modern medicine did not really recognize it until the 1970s. Lyme disease (or very similar ailments) can be caused by a number of different species of Borrelia spirochetes around the world, but the US CDC and NIH only recognizes Borrelia burgdorferi, so that is what the standard  commercial labs in the USA test for with very specific and accurate tests. If you have essentially the same disease caused by a slightly different Borrelia spirochete, the test comes back negative and the doctor crosses Lyme Disease off his list of potential pathogens.  What the American doctor should do is cross Borrelia burgdorferi off the list, leaving  B. garinii,  B. afzelli, B. valaisiana, B. lusitaniae, B. bissettii, B. spielmanii, and others see for example http://www.parasitesandvectors.com/content/7/1/4.

If one wants to correctly diagnose Borrelia, you need a very good case history and medical examination.  A doctor that has fallen into the habit of diagnosing from (American) lab tests, may miss-diagnose Lyme Disease.  Europe is far ahead of North America on this, and has better lab tests for Borrelia.

The CDC and NIH assume the ticks feed on deer and white footed mice with the mice acting as the reservoir for the  spirochetes.  The truth is  that a great many mammals and birds can act as host for the ticks and  reservoir for the spirochetes.  In particular, birds can transport infected ticks significant distances.  With climate change we have errant birds traveling all over the place.  There are now vultures in central Europe that carry  Borrelia burgdorferi, which was traditional found only in the North American Atlantic flyway and particularly in New England.  If our birds can fly to Europe, their birds can fly here.

Be aware that the birds at your bird feeder will carry ticks, and some of those ticks are only the size of a poppy seed.  When they have fed, the ticks will drop off.  A few of  those ticks may be infected, and a bite from one can cause Lyme Disease.  Anywhere birds congregate, (infected)  ticks are likely to be found.  On the other hand, under a bird feeder, most of the ticks on the ground will get eaten for dinner by other birds.  Over all, do not sleep on the ground under the bird feeder and the risk is likely to be low.  Anyway, be tick aware.  Wash up after herding sheep, and etc.  It is not so much the sheep, as being out in the tick's world, while you are focused on doing something else and distracted from avoiding ticks.  And, there are hints that other insects may also be able to transmit Borrelia.

The CDC and NIH recommend relatively short cycles of normal doses of tetracycline drugs to treat Lyme Disease.  This may work very well for recent infection/exposure.  However, longer term infections may require longer treatment cycles at higher doses.

Lyme Disease can stay in the body with sub-clinical symptoms, for years, and then sneak up on you with little warning. The symptoms may be very subtle, but over time they will interfere with knitting and spinning.  The symptoms may be very similar to common over-use symptoms that everyone that has gotten good at something has experienced. Keep a log and talk to your doctor.  One of my symptoms was a loss of flexibility and agility.  Another was very minor sinus congestion that I thought was related to dust from working with wool. And, I thought I was just getting old and fat. Individually, these symptoms meant nothing.  Together, they pointed to Borrelia, even when all the lab tests were normal for a healthy male of  my age.   A few weeks of antibiotics, and I feel 10 years younger.

One symptom of chronic Borrelia infection is inflammation. And, we know that Borrelia has been endemic to both Europe and Asia for thousands of years.  Some of the traditional Italian recipes using garlic, rosemary, or basil, actually contain enough natural anti-inflammatory /antibacterial agents to have a real health effect against Borrelia.  Likewise some Asian dishes contain enough clove, and ginger to have a detectable effect.  On the other hand, rosemary oil is toxic to ingest. Tetracycline is safer.

Overconfidence effect

see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overconfidence_effect

And http://www.huffingtonpost.com/wray-herbert/impossible-knowledge-are_b_7421574.html?utm_hp_ref=science

It is very real.

It is also a double edged sword.

If one tests what one is doing every step of the way, one avoids over confidence.  Most "experts" do not test in a step wise fashion. And in fact, I would say that the mark of a true expert is that they have, in fact,  tested everything. It has been said before- "Trust but verify!" and "Always do the calculations from first principles, yourself!"

Most spinners, take treadle cadence times ratio to estimate spinning speed.  At low speed that works, but who cares about low speed?  I use a digital tachometer. I use it enough that I know all of its foibles, and it does have a few.

I make deductions from history.  If they improve my knitting and spinning, then I consider them likely correct. They work, and that is good enough for me.  It is not like somebody might die or be injured if my deductions from history are wrong.  I do not know many other folk that actually test their deductions from history.   They spout dogmas from books, but they do not test them. They just want everybody to accept them without testing.

In particular, the naalbinding of Coptic socks was not a test.  Any knit object can be produced by naalbinding. The test would have been to make socks via naalbinding and via knitting (with a knitting sheath) and test to see which was more like the original.  

Rhine Gold

When I was young, I loved Wagner, but was always unhappy that he mixed up German mythology.

Looking at the recent PBS special on the architecture of Ludwig II, I realized that Wagner was writing in German, but not about "Germans".

In the beginning, the gold of the Rhine, guarded by the Rhine Maidens was the flax/linen grown on the flood plain below the Rhine. Dwarfs, gods, giants, and men could steal, build cities, become monsters, and die, but in end, the greatest wealth in Europe would come from the flax/linen grown on the flood plain below the Rhine. Skill developed in spinning that linen, brought more wealth when applied to wool.  The Rhine Gold made Flanders the richest and most industrialized people of Europe, regardless of who ruled them. 

Centuries later Harrlem was still a rich city based on its skill for bleaching linen.