Longdraw vs Short Forward Handspinning: Pros and cons.

All the wool is a vlog  all about handspinning yarn, processing wool, knitting, owning a wool mill, farm life and everything in between.

If you are unsure of the difference between longdraw spinning and short forward spinning this is a great episode for you! Or maybe you aren't sure why you would want to spin one way vs the other. In this episode I run through the techniques as well as pros and cons for each spinning style. 

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Transcript

0:01

Hello and welcome. This is Kim Beagler, owner of Youthful Fiber Farm and Mill, and I'm sitting here at the mill today coming to you to talk about a long draw versus short forward. A little bit about quick description of each and how they're different, and then some pros and cons of spinning each way. And before I get started, I just wanted to remind you, there are so many places you can find me besides here, including my website, which is youthful fiber farm.com, where you can join the newsletter to get updates on all sorts of fun things. YouTube, I have a channel there called All the Wool. We have a Patreon community where you get access to the fibers that I am milling here. They get early access, which generally means most access and as well as workshops. Like this weekend I'm doing a dyeing acid dyeing with your yarn. And anyway, all sorts of fun things there and a great community. Or you can head to being youthful.com where I am trying to get better about writing again over there. So Patreon does help support all of these, all of these different content forms that I am creating. So it's always appreciated if you can help out there. Okay, so let's get to it. Let's start with short forward. So just a quick description of spinning short forward style. Is your front hand in short forward is the one that is drafting the fibers, so kind of doing a little pinching and pulling forward so that the yarn gets twist in it. The twist is not going behind that front hand, so your front hand is pulling fibers forward. The twist is entering up into that front finger, those front fingers, and then the wheel is taking up the arm. Meanwhile, your backhand is holding the fiber. Your backhand's a little bit less active. It's more just holding the fiber there. It may be doing a little manipulating of the fibers to keep things semi-organized, but it kind of is just very lightly holding the fiber and just keeping it steady for your front hand. The twist is not going between those fingers. Just remember your front hand and your back hand. There should be no twist in there. Moving forward is where you get that twist in, and what you'll get when you spin short forward is a worsted weight yarn. Technically. I'll talk quickly about that in a minute. Okay, so there's your short forward, long draw. We will start with your front hand since we started with your front hand, with short forward in long draw, your front hand can be doing absolutely nothing. Or you can do sort of a supported long draw, which if you've seen me spin in videos, that's generally what I do. Your front hand really is there. If you're using it, it's there to maybe provide a smidge more tension to the yarn as it's getting spun, or it can be there to kind of. Figure, you kind of fix little lumps and bumps as they come up. It can be manipulating the yarn as it's getting spun, so it is more even so supported long draw. Your backhand is doing the majority of the work, right? Your backhand is actually moving backwards against the twist while the twist builds up to it. So if you're using your front hand in long draw, the twist is going right through those fingers or right across that hand. However, you may be using your front hand if you're using it at all, and it's going all the way back to your back hand. And your back hand is drawing fibers backwards. And as that's happening, the twist is coming along just ahead of it and spinning the fibers. So your backhand is in essence sort of doing the drafting. But there's not as much manipulation with that backhand and with the drafting as there is in short, forward long draw, you're kind of trusting the process that as you move backwards, that the wheel as it is doing its magic and adding that twist in, it's sort of doing a fair amount of the drafting for you, but you are helping by moving your hand backwards, which does help do some drafting. You are spinning technically again, a woolen yarn. So now let me talk about the technical ice real quick that I threw in there. A worsted weight yarn technically short forward. It has to be shun spun short forward, right to get a worsted weight yarn. Technically it would be a fiber that has been combed, whether you are doing it at home and combing it, or it goes through an actual combing machine as it's getting processed, which would turn it into top, which is a lot of those lovely braids that you're buying. Not all, but the majority of those really thick, beautiful dyed braids that you're buying are combed. So if you spun that short forward, you're going to get a worsened yarn. Wool and yarn is basically off of Carter's, maybe Rolex. Yeah, off of a carting machine into roving. If you get it that way from a mill and you are spinning it long draw, so the fibers are not as organized, you're spinning it long draw, and that's how you're gonna get a woolen yarn. Those are the technicals. So you could have a semi worshiped, a semi woolen, however you wanna say it, depending on the prep and the spinning. Okay. The other, technically to this would be, there are many people that spend. All sorts of in-betweens of short forward and long draw. You could do a short backward, for sure. There are all sorts of ways. If you go to a festival and you sit and watch a circle of hand spinners, everybody's kind of doing a different thing. Nobody has a set, you know, like not everybody has a set technique. Everybody has their own way. And honestly, as long as you're spinning yarn that way is working for you. So don't worry too much. But if you wanna get more technical about it or learn. To spin the opposite way of your how you're learning. This is kind of some of the, the logistics behind it. I should mention, because I always fail to mention, first off, if you're not a spinner, I do have a beginning spinning course that teaches you short forward. And I also have. A long draw class. The long draw class is a shorter class. It teaches you, assuming you already know how to spin short forward. It teaches you to spin long draw. So if you are looking for an online course or a course in general that is an option for you and you can find that on my website. And you can buy either of them many times and start spending like within five minutes. So. There's some things that I always forget to mention. Okay, so let's talk a little bit about the pros and cons of Short Forward, and I would love to hear from you if you come up with more pros and cons. There is a Google form in the show notes that you can message me or you can send me an email at Youthful Fiber farm@gmail.com. So I always love to hear from you, especially in the audio podcast world because. We don't really know who's out there. So you know, without the comment world, it's kind of hard to know who's engaged or listening or what. Sometimes you all end up in my Patreon community, which I love because then I get to know you there and I get to know where you came from, which is always exciting. Okay, so pros of short forward. So as I just mentioned in my course that I teach beginners to spin on a wheel, I. I teach short forward, and the reason I teach short forward is because I think it feels like you have more control, and in essence you do have more control. I would say you don't have to trust the process so much. So I like to give. New hand spinners, some sense of control in the process because it's a lot of things going on. So to me, one of the pros of spinning short forward is it you feel more in control of the situation because you're just doing a small draft forward, and so like an inch at a time you are spinning versus maybe six inches at a time when you do long drawn. Okay. I would argue that you get a better stitch definition. Off of spinning short forward because as you are spinning, your hands are doing so much manipulation. They actually are sort of sucking the air. They're pushing the air out between the fibers as they're getting spun, right? So there's no air getting trapped in between those fibers.'cause you're fingers are condensing everything, which means that you're gonna get a more sort of compacted and smooth yarn. Okay, it's gonna have less bloom to it. So when you soak it, when it's done, it's not gonna change dramatically as much. And those, that, that more crisp yarn is going to lead to a better stitch definition. So if you were doing lay weight yarn you might get a better result, especially really thin lay weight yarn. If you were going to do something that had really noticeable cabling to it, you might want a crisper yarn. This isn't to say you can't get. This a beautiful yarn for both of those things outta spinning Long draw, but it might be easier to achieve with short forward. Also, because of that compaction that happens, as your fingers are sliding over that yarn, while you're drafting and doing such, you get a heavier color saturation. So because the fibers are more compacted together. There's no air trapped in there. The color is going to come together tighter. The fibers that are dyed are going to come together. Or whether they're natural, they could be natural too. So they're going to pull together tighter and you're gonna get a higher saturation. And you'll see this if you did a little sample of short forward, moved along on your bobin, and then did a long draw, it's gonna look very different. And the colors are not gonna be as saturated in that long draw if you put them side by side. Again, you could control that a little bit in long draw, but you know, these are kind of some of the basics. Okay? You are going to get another pro. If this is a pro for you. In short forward, you will get a cooler, cooler yarn, cooler, woo, cooler yarn, and not just like, Hey, this is super hip cool, but the actual temperature while you're wearing that garment is not going to be as warm therein, it's cooler. Then. Wool and yarn. And the reason, it's the same reason that you're getting a better you're getting a more compacted yarn, you're getting more color saturation is because you're not trapping air.'cause as you're drafting and using those fingers to manipulate all those little inches, the air is getting pushed out. Everything's getting more compacted. So the yarn is not able to hold heat as well, which is a good thing or a bad thing, right? If you were gonna make a summer sweater. Then you would probably be better off with a short forward spun yarn, I should say less noted. Most commercial yarns are spun this way. Most yarns that are spun woolen style will specifically note it because it's kind of, it's, it's not as common, so it's worth noting. And also you are gonna get a slightly different yarn. Okay. I also think that short forward is great if you are gonna be working on a blended fiber that has uneven fiber staple lengths. So if you were working on something that had a long wool staple length, and maybe it was blended with a rabbit. An angle or a rabbit fiber which tends to be, you know, maybe two or three inches. But if you're working with that is blended with a fiber that is five inches, that's a pretty significant difference in staple length. And when you spin short forward because you are manipulating. Inch by inch, it can be easier to manipulate yourself into an even yarn with short forward. Another example would be, you know, you get like a kind of a crazy bat that's got a bunch of stuff thrown in it for fun, but it may not be as easy to spin long draw to get an even yarn. So I really find that it's nice to do, to get a more even yarn out of sort of an uneven fiber blend to spin short forward. Okay, here's two of the, I don't know if they're cons, but they're just what they are. It's much slower to spin short forward because you are doing sort of inch by inch. It is a much slower process now. Slow is great. I mean, we're already spinning yarns, so does it matter if it's slower? That's all up to you. When I first started, I learned short forward, then I learned long draw, and then I had a very hard time getting back to short forward because it's so much faster. But as I've mentioned, there are a lot of pros to spinning stuff short forward, so it just kind of may depend on the project you're working on if you have both skill sets. I do think also that spinning short forward, it is much easier to over spin your yarn to put too much twist in your yarn, especially as a beginner. But that is so normal that as a beginner, don't worry if you're over spinning your yarn. But I think a lot of people can learn short forward and not ever realize for a very long way down the road. I wouldn't know who I'm talking about. Certainly not me. That you may not realize that you are over spinning, but if you're working with a Marino, like a lot of people start with like a Marino top because it's easy to get and you're spinning it and then your finished yarn is not like super soft. A lot of times that's because you've over spun it. And so it, you can turn just about any fiber into rope if you put too much twist in it. So it is easier, I think, to over spin a short forward yarn. Some of that is the learning curve and being nervous when you start. And then some of that is maybe you just don't really understand how much twist you need and how to get that yarn you want. So, okay, there we are with short forward. I can't believe I've been talking for 15 minutes almost. This is crazy. It's amazing how long I can talk about wool and yarn. Okay, so let's talk about long draw. Like I said, I learned long draw, probably two years into spinning. And man, it took me years before I would spin short forward again. And now I have gotten more comfortable again with short forward partially because I know now not to over twist it. I think learning long draw helped me really understand the difference between over twisted, twisted, well under twisted. But now I also am focused on going a little slower with things. I don't need to pump out an insane amount of yarn because what the heck am I gonna do with it? I still have to knit it into something. So anyway. Long draw. Let's start with our pros, right? Super fast, obviously I've said, I mean, at least twice as fast, maybe even faster than that because you are literally, you can, you can draw backward with that backhand. You can pull back like a good eight inches, 12 inches, depending on how much trauma you wanna cause your shoulder over the years. But it's very, very fast. So that is one big perk of it. To the opposite of short forward, it's gonna be a warmer yarn. So if you are, and again, I'm talking temperature because as you're spinning back, there's no compaction happening. Your front hand may, depending on how you spin your front hand may compact a little bit. The less you slide that hand down the yarn, as you are spinning longer, draw, the less compaction that's gonna happen. The less you are using that front hand to manipulate the front part of your yarn, the, the less. The squishing of the air out is going to happen. So if you're just spinning backwards, all that air gets trapped in there. There's plenty of time for air to get trapped into those fibers as you're drafting back. So the fi, the air in that fiber that is then in that yarn helps keep warmth in. So if you're wanting a big, old warm sweater, wool and yarn is fantastic. Long draw yarn you're going to get in general. This isn't always the case. This of course depends how you spin it, but in general, you will get a loftier, and I'm gonna use the word squishy or yarn for kind of the same reason because there's so much air that gets trapped that does, that gets trapped. Sorry. That gets trapped as you are drafting backwards in your, in your long draw yarn. That makes for a squishy yarn when you go to soak that yarn. After you're done spinning it, you've spun it, maybe youli it, you're gonna soak it. There's all this bloom because there's so much air in between those fibers that you get that bloom. I think long draw is exceptional for some of those coarser ws, especially because we are, we do tend to not put as much twist in when we spin, long draw, which then can make a coarser wool feel a little bit less itchy. Because it's got a little more loft and squished to it. The bloom is magnificent when you spin, long draw, for sure. Okay, so the cons, it can be easier to underpin your yarn, especially when you're first learning long draw because you automatically sort of, and you're nervous and all the things. And this can happen to any of us at any time. But you spin back and you sort of assume as the second that that twist gets to your fingers, it's time to let the wheel take the fi the yarn away from you. So you're spinning, but you're drafting back. The, the twist is entering. It gets to your back hand. You automatically go forward. Now that may not always be the case. Like you may spin an entire bobbin, go apply, and then all of a sudden your yarn keeps breaking and breaking and breaking while you're applying. You've unders spun it. It's very common when you first learn to spin, long draw. So where it's very common to over twist in short forward. Long draw. It's very common to under twist and it takes some practice. And the ways you can deal with that are either by dropping your whirl, your drive band down to a smaller whirl size if you've got it. Because that will have twist enter faster. That's one of the easiest ways to do it. The other option would be to hold onto your fiber longer. So you draft back, you let that twist build, maybe you sit there for an extra count or two while twist continues to build. And then you go ahead and let the wheel take it up, and that will have more twist in your yarn therein, making it stronger. Another underside of under spinning. E. E. So you. Under spun it a little, you applied it, you made a sweater. What may happen is you may get more peeling because if it's unders spun a bit, it's easier for those fibers to sort of work their way out and create those pills. So I am guilty of this for sure, and as I have gotten better at spinning calmer, at spinning, I just put a little more twist in than I used to. Okay. My other con of long draw is that once that magical bloom happens, you tend to get a lot more diameter in your yarn. So you thought you were spinning a single, that you were gonna apply together and make a DK weight yarn. But once you applied that yarn and now it's bloomed. You maybe have a worse weight yarn. It's easier for this to happen because as I've mentioned, that air that gets trapped in the fight in the yarns as you're spinning back, then you go to soak it, it blooms. It's beautiful, but you don't have the right yarn weight that you want it. Again, one of the ways to combat that is to put a little more twist in your yarn. Really the biggest way to combat, to combat that is to do a sample. And I know. It's like swatching you all like, oh my gosh, really? I wanna like sample, spin and then soak and then dry and then see where I get. Well, I'm gonna be honest, that's probably the easiest way to do it. Or you can do what I do, which is a lot of time I find a fiber. I spin the fiber, I see how the fiber turns out, and then I find a project that will fit the fiber. It depends what kind of personality you have, what's gonna work better for you. So. There you have it. There's kind of a run through of the difference of long, drawn, short forward some pros and cons of each one. Like I said, I would love to hear from you all about other pros and cons that you have found along the way. So really it's up to you. It's up to you. My big tip here would be do not switch, which way you are spinning. During a project, it will make a huge difference to the finished yarn, and you'll see it in a bobin. You'll see that I started a project spinning short forward. I walked away from it for three months. I went back. I started a long draw. Oh, why do these yarns look so different on the bobin? Probably that's why. So write notes. You know what easiest way to combat that is write notes as you're going. And that way if you walk away for a couple of months, you can come back and say, oh, I was spinning this Rommel Dale. I was spinning it short forward. I'm gonna keep spinning it short forward. So there you go. There's my big tip from this. So don't forget if you are interested in learning to spin short forward as a beginner. You can find a course my let's make yarn course. Or if you are already a short forward spinner and you want to learn long draw, I have a course for that. So head to the website. I actually think that learning to spin long draw. Fairly early in your spinning process is easier because you are a slightly less set in your ways of short forward. So it's a little easier to bring in a new technique versus years and years of spinning short forward. You're gonna have a little bit more, you've got more muscle memory set in from all those spinning years. Of course, you can absolutely do it. You can do anything. I know you can. So, okay, you all head to my website if you're interested in my courses. Head to my Patreon community. There's links to the show notes. If you are interested in not only supporting the work I put into the content I make, but also joining a wonderful community and maybe getting great access to fiber. You can head to my blog being youthful.com and YouTube, of course, if you wanna see videos of me making stuff at the mill, me hand spinning, yarn, all of those things, sometimes trips to the, to the farm. That's where to go. So thank you all so much for listening. Until next time, keep on spinning, knitting, doing all the things. I will talk to you all soon. Thank you.