I use commercial 4ply cotton, mostly from Bendigo Woollen Mills and other sources as well. I was surprised to learn “it was hard”. Noone told me that before I started. A good thing I think.
I’ll start with the obvious. Cotton has no give, not a lot
of memory and doesn’t want to bend or perhaps loop well within the needles. The
more transfers in the row with a lot of stitches in work means problems with
transfers.
There’s a little bit of difference between the KH lace
makers and the SK’s LC 1 or 2. The brother lace carriage transfers all the
stitches with the lace carriage and then two rows are knitted with the main carriage and will do fine
lace. Whereas the SK’s LC is a separate complete carriage and either knit and transfers
in the same row (called simple lace) or with the flipping of a lever and
removal of yarn, works the same as the KH’s method – transfers all then flip
the lever back, yarn back in and knit two rows. This is fully fashioned lace.
Next is the logistics
of getting your cotton lace project made with as few dropped stitches as possible.
First thing is to make sure you have a really good sponge/retainer bar. A must.
Next is to bring out all the needles that are planned to be used. I hope you
can see from the photo.
If a needle has a bent shaft or tip. the stitches will not
transfer correctly and drop. It’s far easier to replace them. It really is. If
you pinch them together you will see – one way will transfer, but the next time
you ask it to transfer the opposite direction, no luck, stitch drops.
Next on the list is weights. I know, I know some people don’t
use them. Well they probably don’t knit cotton lace either, because for lace,
we need them. Lovely even weight evenly across all stitches to ensure they transfer correctly, knit off and stay put.
And the yarn. It must not have ANY KNOTS, breaks in the yarn
HAVE to be on the sides, I’m sorry, but knots create havoc.
On that long row – a lot of transfers in the same row on a wide
piece, I always run my thumb along the needle butts. I can feel the transfers
that have not gone to plan as the
needle doesn’t go back all the way to same place as its neighbour, the stitch
hasn’t formed correctly, so I flip the yarn off the needle, check the transfer,
fix if need be, and reknit. If I don’t, this one will drop next row, whether it
is knitted or not.
It never hurts to have really good light and check the row
has knitted correctly. I usually do this at the same time I’m running my thumb
across the needle butts. It adds a little bit of time to the project, but the
bonus is no dropped stitches, no jammed carriages. After a couple of repeats of
the pattern it becomes pretty clear where the transferring is a big ask in
cotton. And the less dropped stitches the quicker the work is off the machine
and on to the next project.
I’ve done hand transfers
on 8ply cotton blend, excellent, but again, nice even, firm weights are
essential to keeping the stitches on the needles. And it only took me an
afternoon to do the front panels, pretty quick really.
2 comments:
I just bought a used LC2 and am bitterly disappointed that it's not working properly for me. I'm using a fine Tencel yarn, stitch size 5, tension 3. The first two scarves I knitted were trouble-free, now - after a few rows the carriage jams, the hooks on needles become distorted and need replacing and yarn breaks. I'm spending more time unravelling than I am knitting. I've tried looser tension, larger stitches but the same things happen.
I know Tencel, like cotton, doesn't have any "give" and wonder if you can give me any advice. As the carriage is used, I now wonder if it is malfunctioning - or if it is me that is malfunctioning! So frustrating! Any thoughts you have will be most welcome. Thanks.
First check your sponge. It really, really likes a good sponge bar.
Are the needles OK. Did you change the card?
You will have the most trouble on multiple transfers in the one row. They never like it. (Card one for instance, is a nightmare in cotton and a dream in wool). After knitting those rows I always run my thumb across the needle butts and make sure the transfers have been successful. Then reknit or attend to any that aren't right. I know it's a pain, and I don't do it on wool, but on the cotton, all those transfers put a lot of"pull" on them, it's a big ask. I hope that's helpful.
Post a Comment