Balls O' Yarn

[Akavit]

Somebody at the woodworking forum posted a video of his contraption that makes yarn balls.  I've no idea why anyone needs to take a yarn roll and make a yarn ball but that's besides the point.  It's a fun-looking little gadget.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qx7cudgHYc4&feature=youtu.be[/yt]

[Bernadette]

Don't tell me about it. Just let me watch it spin. 

This guy reminds me of my uncle: "Oh, hey, I can make one of those!"

[Lynne]

Love that!

[verenaerin]

All the yarn stores have one of those. My mother does as well.


Some yarn comes in hanks. Hanks of yarn are wound in a circle then twisted. You untwist and attach the yarn to this machine to make a ball. A ball of yarn is created to easily pull the yarn without knots occurring. If you did that with a hank of yarn, the whole thing would get tangled, resulting in tears of frustration and possibly fire.

[verenaerin]

This is the one I've seen. It also explains why you cant knit from a hank.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUws9HULCEU[/yt]

[Akavit]

Don't tell me about it. Just let me watch it spin. 

This guy reminds me of my uncle: "Oh, hey, I can make one of those!"

But Delrin on brass...  it's very important information!  I was waiting for him to make a ball but he stopped almost as soon as he got going on the winder.

There are lots of guys like that at the Indiana woodworking school I frequent.  Most of them are retired professionals that have generous incomes and a lot of free time so they busy themselves making stuff.

[Akavit]

This is the one I've seen. It also explains why you cant knit from a hank.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUws9HULCEU[/yt]

So I watched the video so I could see a ball being formed and now I'm interested in those yarn spreaders or whatever they're called.

[verenaerin]

So I watched the video so I could see a ball being formed and now I'm interested in those yarn spreaders or whatever they're called.

Its a very cool but delicate contraption.

[MundaCorMeum]

[q :seeya:uote author=Akavit link=topic=16343.msg356945#msg356945 date=1482041586]

This is the one I've seen. It also explains why you cant knit from a hank.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUws9HULCEU[/yt]

So I watched the video so I could see a ball being formed and now I'm interested in those yarn spreaders or whatever they're called.
[/quote]

If you need someone to test a prototype for you     .  I have a yarn ball winder, but not the swift.  That winder in the video is beautiful! Working from a yarn cake (I've heard them called that, after they've been wound...a yarn cake.  Sounds pretty nice to me!) is so much better than working from a skein or hank.  It doesn't tangle as easily.  And, having eveything uniformly shaped, even though varying in size, makes storage easier.

[Bernadette]

I remember seeing a blog post showing yarn hanks being put around the back of a chair, which I thought was pretty clever.

[MundaCorMeum]

I remember seeing a blog post showing yarn hanks being put around the back of a chair, which I thought was pretty clever.

Done that.  I usually have one of the kids hold it for ms, though. 

[Akavit]

If you need someone to test a prototype for you     . 

Not a chance that I'm going to step into that product line so sorry, no prototype.  Now that I know the name I could find them online and it's a mature market where they sell for $39.99 everywhere.  Competing with chair backs and unpaid children doesn't help either.

I did find some good pictures and figured out how they work.  Ingenious but actually quite simple.

[Akavit]

Seems like a cone would make for a superior swift.  Quicker and easier to load it and far less fragile and prone to damage.  The only advantage I can see to that collapsible design is that it folds up into a tiny package for easy storage and transportation.

[Carleendiane]

Seems like a cone would make for a superior swift.  Quicker and easier to load it and far less fragile and prone to damage.  The only advantage I can see to that collapsible design is that it folds up into a tiny package for easy storage and transportation.

Akavit, you are a man of a vast array of interests. Really an interesting quality. Do you look at ever thing like a project to be improved upon or redesigned?

[Akavit]

Akavit, you are a man of a vast array of interests. Really an interesting quality. Do you look at ever thing like a project to be improved upon or redesigned?

Correct.  To my mind, everything is just an intermediate step to something superior.  Anyone that visits my workshop on a regular basis will see this.  Stuff moves, machines are bought or sold, junk is sorted and disposed of and everything keeps getting arranged in a more orderly manner.  Though I may work 60-70 hours in a week, it's rare for me to spend more than 40 hours actually creating products.  The rest of the time is spent improving workflow.  It really kills my profits in the short term but long-term, it allows me to do a lot more work in a week than most woodworkers can do.

Today I spent 1 hour working on an order and 8 hours sorting through my finishing supplies.