Core Spinning Over Wire

 

 

The wonderful ladies of Quirky Bits-n-Pieces sent me some gorgeous Leicester Longwool locks from Deborah's new dye lot to play with.  (I'll include the color name as soon as I have it.)  You can find all the available color ways in her online Craft Emporium.

As part of the 2016 Creative Team, and as an OCD artist, it is my job to create something beautiful with them.  It's easy when I have such lovely materials to work with!  The gorgeous colors and luster of these locks inspired me to show it off by making fiber jewelry and the very first step is to corespin over wire!

Fiber mail!

Researching Corespinning

I never do anything the easy way; I'd never corespun before this project!  I don't let little things like that shop my inspiration, however, so now I needed to learn the basics of corespinning.  I went to my go-to source of YouTube to learn the technical aspects before I started at my wheel.  I have made a playlist on YouTube of spinning techniques.  Below are the three corespinning videos that I found most helpful.

Bringing in the Wire

Okay, so now I understand the basics of corespinning.  But what differences does the wire bring in?  In the above videos there was a large emphasis on how to handle the twist of the core but wont wire break?  How do I handle that?  There are surprisingly few videos on wire corespinning on YouTube but below are the ones I found.  I also have a YouTube playlist about Wire.

Hands On

So now that I've done my research it is time for me to get my hands involved.  Nothing will replace the knowledge that working with my own hands (or yours!) will bring.  What wire you use will depend on what you want to do with it, of course, but for now I'll say that you can corespin over any wire that you can get onto your wheel.

One of the very first things I learned was that we need to have a strong, wire leader!  If it isn't strong enough it wont have the umph to twist the wire core.  I solved this by dedicating one of my spools to wire spinning.  I took off my cotton leader and wrapped some 20 gauge wire around it.  The only way I could find to keep the wire from twisting around the bobbin was to duct tape it on.  (If you find another way, please let me know!)  I used a small piece on either side of the of the center.  Be careful about spinning this back and fourth as it will be a breaking point.  I've had to replace my wire leader a few times.

At the Wheel: Corespinning

Here's my video showing you what I do from start to finish!  I'm using 26g Artistic Wire and some random wool I had in my stash in this video.




Attach your wire core via bending a hook in both the leader and core.  If your leader is strong enough you wont need to do anything else.  Keep the tension low to none at the beginning.  To get the fiber started, I found it very difficult to start over the smooth wire.  Spinning directly over the hook, hence texture, made it a snap.  If I don't want the lumpy loop at the end, which I generally don't, once the spinning is established I stop treadling.  I'll have about an inch of yarn at this point; I gently tug the fiber towards me and off of the hook, then I slip it back up under the hook and pinch it closed a bit more.  Now you can crank up your tension setting pretty high to encourage the wire to feed onto your spool; adjust it to your preferences.  Depending on your wheel and thickness / softness of your wire, you may need to "feed" the wire onto the spool.

You can work with an art batt for a wonderfully textured yarn; its all kinds of random fun!   If you want it smooth, I found it easiest to have my fiber mostly pre-drafted,  then I gently cup my wire with my thumb and two forefingers with the wool strand feeding the core from between my fingers.

If at any point you draft too thinly, you can always feed the yarn back up the core and then continue back down the wire core.  This is also how I end the spinning when I get to the end of my wire!  When I see the end coming I break the wool.  I treadle slower and carefully corespin to the end (without going past! a tiny bit short is okay) and then spin back up the wire I've already spun.  Then I lick my fingers and gently hold the tip between my wet fingers, still spinning, to felt it a tiny bit with the friction.

If you want to see a blooper of my first version of this video, click here!  My son is hilarious! I was using Quirk Bits n Pieces fiber in the blooper. :)

Leicester longwool core spun over wire

Core Plying

 The main difference between corespinning and core plying is that the pre-drafted fiber has twist in it. :)  That's pretty much it as far as technique goes.  You can ply smoothly, or play with a bit of texture.  I like plying onto wire with the Wrap and Roll technique.





Me again!  This time using 20g medium soft wire and Quirky Bits n Pieces's Leicester longwool.




I've been spinning and plying over wire for several weeks now and I absolutely love it.  I see so many possibilities to play with this yarn that keeps it shape!  In my next post I'll show you several pieces of jewelry that I designed using core spinning over wire!  For now I'll leave you with this teaser.

Instructions coming soon!