| Term | Description |
|---|---|
| Batt | A wide, rolled-up bundle of carded fleece that unrolls into a blanket. |
| Bench | A table of the spinning wheel on which the wheel and spinning mechanism are mounted |
| Bulk | Wool’s filling power or “bounce” is the volume occupied by wool fibers. It can be applied to loose wools, slivers, or yarn and is expressed as cm3/g measured in a bulk-o-meter (bulk meter). Loose wools can range from 20 to 35 cm3/g with the values for sliver and yarn being progressively lower. |
| Butt-end | The end that was cut in shearing the sheep. |
| Carding | From Latin Carduus, meaning thistle or teasel. It is a process of disentangling and aligning fleece fibers. A hand carder or a drum carder is used. |
| Draft | Pulling out of fibers to allow only a certain amount of the fiber to twist into thread |
| Drafting triangle | Fanned-out fibers forming a triangle between an active hand and a passive hand in spinning. |
| Draw | A technique of pulling out fibers in the spinning process. The technique includes long draw and short draw. |
| Drive band | A cord carrying the power from the large wheel to the spindle or bobbin/pulley |
| Drop spindle | A stick with a weighted whorl that is used to twist fibers into thread (aka hand spindle). |
| Drum carder | A drum-like tool that cards fibers for spinning. |
| Fleece | Raw wool shorn from a wool animal, such as goat, sheep, vicuna, etc. before being processed into yarn. |
| Grease wool | Unwashed wool as it comes off of a sheep. |
| Grist | Yarn property that describes the relationship between yarn’s weight and its length. Grist is expressed in units of length per unit of weight. (Eg. 10 yards per ounce or 160 yards per pound.) |
| Hand carder | A tool used to hand-card fleece (a process similar to brushing). It is typically a large paddle set with 1/4 inch (0.6 cm) curved metal tines. |
| Hank | A coil or skein of yarn. A measurement of the length per unit mass of cloth or yarn, which varies according to the type being measured. A hank of worsted wool is 560 yards long (560 yd/lb = 1.129 km/kg). |
| Hogget | A yearling sheep (Brit.). A lamb between weaning and first shearing (NZ). |
| Kemp | Kemp is generally a chalky-white, brittle, weak fiber that may be mixed with normal fibers in a sheep’s wool fleece. Kemp fibers are often detached from the skin. This hair is not desirable in a fleece, as it does not accept dye, minimizing both the quality and the value of the wool. |
| Knot | A 40-yard strand skein of yarn wound on a reel or a niddy-noddy that measures 2 yards in circumference = 80 yards. |
| Leader | A piece of yarn afixed to the shaft of a bobbin to start spinning new yarn. |
| Niddy-noddy | A universal folk name describing a double-headed tool used to skein spun yarn. The implement was called a hand reel in Colonial days. |
| Noil | Large clumps of tangled wool and knots combed out of wool fiber before spinning. |
| Quill | A weaver’s spindle. |
| Rolag | A roll of fiber generally used to spin woolen yarn. A rolag is created by first carding the fiber and then gently rolling the fiber off the cards. If properly prepared, a rolag will be uniform in width, distributing the fibers evenly. |
| Roving | Fiber is carded or combed into a long continuous cord that is 2″-3″ thick. The fibers are going in multiple directions (but generally more aligned than a rolag or batt). This preparation of fiber is best suited to woolen spinning. |
| S-twist | Yarn spun with a counterclockwise twist. It looks like the letter “S”. |
| Scour | A synonym for washing used in the textile industry, especially in the sense of getting something thoroughly clean. |
| Skein | A length of yarn or thread that has been loosely coiled and knotted. |
| Skeining | Winding the thread off the spindle. |
| Skirting | The process of removing junk wool, stains, second cuts, and vegetable matter (VM) from the wool fleece prior to processing or offering for sale. |
| Sliver | Long strips of fiber created by carding or combing and drawing into long strips. Sliver is a thinner version of roving. |
| Slubs | Thick and thin areas in spun yarn. |
| Spinning count | A measure of wool diameter developed in England. It is defined as the number of hanks of yarn that can be spun from a pound of a clean wool top. |
| Staple | Length of a lock of fleece or a single fiber. |
| Strick | A bundle of flax prepared for spinning after the tow has been removed (long fibers only). |
| Suint | (Pronounced Soo-INT). Concentrated sheep sweat. It consists largely of potassium-based salts of fatty acids, combined with sulfate, phosphate, and nitrogen compounds. The “grease” part is a form of wax. In the trade, this stuff is referred to as wool fat. As extracted from the scouring process, it is called degras, and in a refined form comes to market as lanolin. |
| Top | Fiber is combed to provide spinning fiber in which all the fibers are parallel. This preparation of fiber is best suited to worsted or semi-worsted spinning. |
| Tow | Short fibers, which are left after the flax is combed out. |
| Woolen | A yarn spun from a rolag using a long draw technique. Woolen yarn is soft, light, stretchy, and full of air as opposed to worsted yarn which is strong, dense, and sleek. |
| Worsted | 1. A technique that involves spinning long parallel fibers all aligned in the same direction from the butt-end to the tip. A short draw is used to spin worsted wool. The contrasting technique is woolen. 2. A particular weight of yarn that produces a gauge of 16-20 stitches per 4 inches of stockinette, and is best knitted with 4.5mm to 5.5mm needles (US size 7-9). |
| Wuzzing | Spinning out the water when washing, scouring, and rinsing fleece or yarn. It operates on the same principle as the spin cycle on a washing machine. |
| Z-twist | The yarn spun with a clockwise twist. It looks like the letter “Z”. |
