Sampling Sloopy

About a week ago, Gia asked what had happened to my "Hang on Sloopy" superwash merino from Crown Mountain Farms. At the time, I hadn't gotten started on it yet because I wanted to bond with my WooLee Winder a bit more before taking on spinning a fiber I had never spun before. Believe it or not, I've not actually tried a 100% merino spinning fiber yet, and certainly not one that is prepared to superwash. So I wanted to make sure I understood my equipment well before I dove into all that orangey goodness.

When I first posted about Sloopy, I asked the one burning question I had about making sock yarn from this fiber: 2 ply or 3 ply? The answers I got summed up to "3 ply gives you the best and most durable yarn, but a tightly spun and plied 2 ply can do well under the right circumstances". In fact, I even got some email from Teyani, owner of Crown Mountain Farm. She told me that the Sock Hop yarn that she and her team of spinners create is a two ply. This was confirmed by Cheryl who is one of Teyani's spinners, who also reminded me that with a three ply, my color intervals would be closer together and the defined regions of color that would create stripes would be harder to distinguish. So now I was torn. Which way to go? I even went so far as to deconstruct some of my favorite merino yarns for socks: Koigu is a 2 ply, Socks that Rock yarns are 3 plys.

So that left me really with just one thing to do: spin up some samples for myself. With 8 ounces of Sloopy at my disposal, I didn't need to feel nervous about not having enough for a sock project after the test.

Hang On Sloopy in 2 Ply Form

This fiber did take a little time for me to get used to spinning. I found that at the drive ratio that I wanted to spin it at (about 10:1) the take up could be a little strong as the first layer of single was wrapped on the bobbin. After a little practice I got something that I liked and that I could maintain relatively easily. This fiber is absolutely fabulous to spin with. Truly and honestly some of the nicest hand-dyed that I have put my hands on. I spun up enough so that I could 2-ply from a center pull ball and ended up with about 29 yards to play with: plenty for swatching.

Measuring WPI and Looking At Color Variation

My 2 ply turned out to be about 17 WPI -- pretty respectable for a sock yarn. For instance, STR Medium weight is about the same WPI. I like the handle of the yarn and it "feels right" to me. Since I was shooting for reproduceability, I took some notes about this yarn. As an aside, I got to see some real Sock Hop yarn courtesy of Cara, who was visiting Chicago this weekend. My yarn is quite different from the Sock Hop yarn as far as plying goes. I think I ended up with a tighter ply. Both are neat looking yarns. I think that is part of what is great about spinning your own, you can get so many looks from the same starting point.

Hang on Sloopy, 3-Ply

For my three ply, I started out with the same ratio on my wheel (the 10:1) and spun onto 3 separate bobbins. That was when I realized I had a problem -- I had used all of my WooLee Winder bobbins and now had to go back to one of my Lendrum flyers to do the job, so I wouldn't be able to make the 3 ply using the same drive ratio as I had for the 3 ply. Note to self: 4 bobbins is better than three. So I ended up trying out my Lendrum fast flier to try to get a similar ratio. Not such a good idea because I over plied this poor yarn in a big way. I actually had to do some untwisting afterwards, which is why this yarn looks a little bit iffy.

When I measured the WPI on this yarn, I got 16, which isn't too surprising. I usually find that with the same diameter single, my 2 and 3 ply yarns are very similar at the WPI level, it's just the dimensionality that has changed.

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2 Ply vs. 3 Ply Sloopy Swatches

But the real proof is in the swatch. So I knit up a test swatch from both yarns. The 2 ply swatch I knit on US size 1 needles, the 3 ply I knit on US size 1.5 needles to give the yarn a little more room to be lofty, while still maintaining a fabric similar to the density I would want for socks. I also put the 2 ply sock through a complete wash and dry cycle (standard washing conditions that my socks experience) to see how it held up to being washed.

The striping issue that Cheryl pointed out is absolutely true. The stripes are much more prominent in the 2 ply swatch than the three ply swatch. I also like the feel of the 2 ply yarn better both before and after washing. I've never been one to like really thick socks unless I am wearing big heavy boots and I don't do that very often. And after washing, while the yarn developed an ever-so-slight halo, it really didn't fuzz or felt at all. Nor did I experience a change in the size or gauge of the sample. I am ever so smitten with both the fiber and the resulting yarn. So I think that I will be going with a two ply yarn for this project.

I'm also pretty sure that I will be ordering more of this fiber... this swatch got a thumbs up from the husband as well (although not in such a bright color) so if I can find a colorway that meets his needs, I think he's going to get a pair of handspun, hand knit socks for Christmas.

One other thing came up in my first Sloopy post. Julie (blogless) mentioned that after washing her yarn, the orange bled and the white areas took up the orange dye. Teyani very quickly emailed me, Julie and her spinners to find out more about this since she was very concerned about the potential problem, even though Julie was not unhappy with the fiber at all (three cheers for Teyani for being so concerned about good customer experience!). Teyani is very careful about making sure her dye exhausts correctly and about rinsing carefully to get rid of free dye. As it turns out, Julie was soaking the yarn in hot water and using vinegar in the finish rinse. If you haven't ever done any dyeing yourself, you need to know two things: 1) sometimes hot water can cause dye to leach (it's good to be reasonably gentle with hand-dyed products when it comes to temperatures) and 2) vinegar sets dye. So if you work with hand-dyed fiber that has white intervals, be gentle on your fiber after you finish it and soak in cooler water and leave out that vinegar finish. I know a lot of sources recommend vinegar to help make sure your colors stay color fast, but you might want to save that advice for commercially prepared solid colored yarns.

So now it's time for me to get back to my wheel and let more of this wonderful fiber slip through my fingers!