Selecting An Awesome Yarn Winder

If you are a first class knitter who buys hand-spun yarn or other workman yarn in hanks or skeins, you'll surely want to purchase some sort of ball winder, with or without a swift. The ball winder has a shaft or shaft around which the yarn is wrapped, while the swift supports the yarn in such a way that it can easily be fed on to the winder. Winders can be manual or electrical, made from plastic or wood.

A popular, inexpensive model is the Lacis Yarn Ball Winder, a hand operated yarn winder which makes perfect pull thread balls up to 4 oz without requiring tubes or cones. Its yarn feeder provides an even flow and prevents tangling. Positive reviews point out that it's inexpensive (under $30), transportable and handles all weights of yarn with equal ease. Less positive reviews whinge it is a tiny capacity winder, only up to 4oz per ball, the clamp is too small for some tables, and you need to maintain an even stress of the yarn feed in order to get a firm ball.

Very like the Lacis, is the Royal Wool Ball Winder. It's a little more dear, but appears to be correspondingly tougher. The Royal is designed in such a manner the yarn fundamentally cannot get caught in the mechanism. It also clamps to a table and works best with a swift.

Nancy’s Knit Knacks makes a somewhat costly industrial quality wooden Ball Winder, generally designed for the yarn industry, but great at home, too. It is very sturdy with an enormous (high torque) wooden handle. The handle is snug to use and exceedingly powerful, permitting it to wind fast, while making no noise. It can wind balls up to 1 Lb. Or even more.

If your arm tires easily using a hand winder, the Boye Electric Yarn Ball Winder may be the answer. It fast and simply winds hanks of yarn into centre-pull skeins. It can wind thin yarns together to form different colors and thicknesses. Some users complain that the yarn is wound to firmly, while others say the opposite, the ball is too loosely wound. Probably the answer to the difficulty lies in adjusting the turn-rate. Other users have moaned that the smooth plastic causes the yarn to slip off the end of the tube but the majority of users find the speed and simplicity of an electrical winder outweigh other troubles.

There is not a massive assortment of Ball Winders to make a choice from. Factors that influence which one is good for you include price, volume of wool you need to wind, and space you have available. The big decision is whether to abandon Grandmother's back-of-the-chair technique and invest in some technology to keep your knitting projects spinning along.

Check our overwhelmingly cool site about winders for yarn balls here. And have a look at this post about The Lacis Yarn Ball Winderwhile you’re there.