Tour de Fleece 2026 (context under the cut at the bottom)
Day 1:
The options to work with are a daelgan style spindle that spins decently, a medieval style drop spindle that doesn't (because I can't get the weight heavy enough), and three whorls that need a wooden dowel that is... Somewhere. I'm not sure where.
Daelgan should be the best option, as that thing has held up to a fair bit of abuse and...
Ah.
So.
That exploded.
After... Half an hour. And being dropped 3 times.
At least my spindles are PLA and the carnage can and will be recycled.
Which means we're switching to...
Yeah. This thing is fighting me more than the wooden one. I've put in an extra hour, and I'm not having a good time, so I'm gonna see if I can dig up the dowel ones.
If anyone wants to leave suggestions for very sturdy drop spindles that ship to Germany or Belgium, feel free to send them my way.
First time participating
Skill level: fair weather spinner
Goal: just spin every day, ideally for at least an hour, see if skill improves
Tools: the white roving I bought ages ago and whatever hand spindles I can fish out of moving boxes, because I do not have the ergonomics of my spinning wheels down. (And they're down in the basement and I don't want to re-tetris that place unless I have to)
I have 8 3D printed spindles and 1 wooden one. The wooden one came in a cheap kit off Etsy in 2009. It fought me then, and it didn't get kinder with getting easier wool, so I'm trying to avoid using it.
I'm also trying to avoid using the 3 Turkish spindles because they don't come apart easily once you've loaded them up, and I've broken at least two shafts so far. Our printer is having issues, so I'm really really really trying to not break any spindles.
Also, if there's singles already on the spindle, I'm just gonna keep going. This is a skill building exercise, not a project. I do not have the skill for a project.
Spun until the thread started breaking from (presumably) the weight and stopped. No idea why this spindle keeps calling the shots on how much I can spin on it, but not feeling like being frustrated about it.
We try something else tomorrow.
No, I have not fixed the printer yet. Yes, I know it would be less than half an hour. This is about spinning, not 3D printing.
I've been spinning on the little bottom whorl drop spindle for a bit and... It's getting hard to get my half hitch securely around the top. So time for a change.
Have I fixed the 3D printer yet? Nope, I was too busy sewing and being in the ER. But my 10-yo, bought, 3D printed Turkish drop spindle is lying the there, so let's try adding some fiber to...
Aaand it's too heavy to hold thread. Which is fine. It's not like this thing has always been an utter pain to disassemble with thread on it and--
Well. The good news is, it's no longer fighting back. The bad news is, those cracks are not supposed to be there. This is someone printing what I've got reason to believe is someone else's model for profit, without crediting them. Out of PLA, which, as we learned on day one, is not impact resistant. (It's meant for prototyping, not longevity.) The shaft doesn't match because that broke ages ago. The sides of the crossbeams show that whoever printed it struggled with bed adhesion--and used infill meant for speed, not durability.
But, for now, it's holding together just fine. It still spins the most stable of all PLA-based spindles I've got. I know which free model got used, so I can print a replacement as soon as the printer is fixed. So, turtle off, new leader on and we'll see if it holds out until my impulse buy comes in.
I got stuck in packing hell for a few days but I did get to spin so here's what happened.
On Day 14 I plied the spun mystery roving, because I wanted to keep spinning with my new toy the wooden spindle. And then I got "just a new leader, just to get the ball rolling" started with my usual roving, which was less forgiving than the scratchy stuff, but somehow nicer to work with.
Today, I was packing and driving all day so I only got to spin once I was at a new location, where they speak German with a distinctly different accent.
Today the neck brace officially comes off, and my gift to myself arrived (for dragging myself to the ER while in too much pain to shave my face or change into something slightly more dignified than a nightgown). A spindle shaft and whorl from Regenbogenwolle, after @koniknits made me realize they are not sold out of spindles if you check out their modular ones. And it came with a surprise bit of fluff to test it out with!
The pictures did not (and still do not) show that there's a gold sheen painted over the green. Not sure if the whorl is the most practical, but it was the one that spoke to me the most. Zero point something skill, everything else vibes has been the theme of this challenge for me so far, and it's not steered me wrong yet.
So I spun all the fluff in a 1 hour 40 minute session my fingers weren't grateful for. I'm not sure what wool this is, but it's something very forgiving (or I've mysteriously improved a massive amount overnight) that sheds a lot, has some kind of halo, and wants to really really really stick to itself regardless of if it's spun or not. It does not, however, want to hold onto a twist if let go for even half a second. It also feels rougher than the "white - German sheep" that I've been using after buying way too much at a budget price years ago (the advice was: "the most forgiving roving is rough, scratchy and probably unpopular, so see what the cheapest thing they have is"). It's drafting consistently with practically zero effort.
I'm not sure I like the roving, but the spindle is pretty stable and it holds a fair amount of spin if given space to do so. Let's see what day 13 brings!
