Fiber Arts Friday – Page 13 – Dutch Hollow Acres

February 25, 2011February 25, 2011

FAF: The First US Alpaca Industry

Welcome back to FAF. I hope you have your learning caps on because I’ve been digging into the research again.

This time I wasn’t sure what I was looking for but ended up getting all angry at today’s alpaca industry. Long story short? Why is it in the late 1800’s there was a perfectly sustainable alpaca fiber industry in the US without a single alpaca on American soil, yet today there are all these co-ops, registries, organizations and still we’re not getting paid for our fiber raised right here in America? ARGH. Ok rant done.

If you’ve read my post about Abraham Lincoln you’ll know that alpaca was his favorite textile but what happened to that thriving industry? As it turns out around 1865 alpaca fiber was brought to the US and there was a very demanding market for 12 years. 2 alpaca mills were even established in Massachusetts, one in Holyoke and the other in Lawrence and specialized in linings, yarn, and dressed goods.

During its heyday, there was more demand for alpaca than there was availability and in 1875 the first alpacas were brought to the US and resided in the Alleghany Mountains in Maryland. Unfortunately, as soon as the alpacas got here the demand for their fiber fell. I guess the trends of the day changed and consumers were after luster deprived fabrics, yuck.

The small herds of alpacas in Maryland were not doing very well either. The lush grasses and atmospheric conditions were thought to be the culprit. If I had $ to bet I’d say it was the M-worm that took its toll on the flock. The high elevations of the Rockies was thought to be the only place where alpacas would ever survive in the country.

At the time of the writing of the article (1883) there wasn’t a single alpaca living from the 1875 import. Thankfully, in 1883 another interest by consumers for alpaca was re-awakening and experiments blending alpaca with silk were showing to be favorable. The author made assumptions that with renewed interest and new favorable locations in Wyoming and Nevada that alpacas would be prominent in America and would rival that of the merino sheep industry.

Well I guess we both know that the US now days is known neither for its thriving alpaca fiber industry nor is it the world leader for merino sheep. *sigh*

Other than bookworming I’ve been happily working away doing fibery things. Unfortunately I’m not using alpaca in my projects?! Why? Because it takes between 8-14 months for my fiber to get back from the mill! It’s been so long that I don’t even remember what day let alone month I sent my fiber to the mill. (Seriously rant over I promise)

I have been working on a baby blanket for a friend of mine and my sock yarn shawl for another. I also picked up some beautifully green yarn on sale at Joann’s. Ok I know, its Joann’s but I had a 10% off my entire order coupon and the yarn was on clearance too.

What have you been up to? Be sure to check out these other Fiber Folks.

Encyclopaedia Britannica 1888

February 18, 2011February 25, 2011

Fiber Arts Friday: 1st Textile Patent

If you happen to follow me on Twitter or Facebook you’ll know that I usually toss out a “today in history” blurb. I was inspired by one of these for today’s FAF post.

Monday might have been Valentine’s Day but it is also another exciting day in US fiber history. In 1974 the first US Textile Patent went to James Davenport of Philadelphia. His first mechanical invention was used for carding and spinning wool followed closely on February 24^th for another patent for weaving and beating sail duck.

I found an advertisement for the invention and was floored by the use of boys for the labor. Obviously this was way before labor laws.

The following was from h-net.org

Advertisement in Massachusetts Mercury, Aug. 24, 1798, in William R. Bagnall, Textile Industries of the United States, I (Cambridge, Mass., 1893), 225.

James Davenport received the first patent issued in the United States for his spinning machinery in Philadelphia (1794). He set up his machinery for spinning and weaving by water power at the Globe Mills, Philadelphia. The labor was chiefly performed by boys, one of whom was able to spin 292,000 feet of flax or hempen thread in a day of ten hours.

Spinning by Machinery

Into Thread and Twine

James Davenport proposes to sell or erect his Machine for spinning Hemp, Flax and Tow; he will complete it, and let it to work, and instruct any person inclined to purchase. These who have seen the machine at work will allow that the subjoined statement is strictly correct.

Thread. Two boys and one man can spin from 20 to 60 lb. per day; according to the fineness, regular and even.

Twine, Seine, or Sewing. This Machine will double twist, and finish from 50 to 60 lbs. per day, with 3 boys from 10 to 12 years old, which for regularity and excellence cannot be surpassed by the twisting by hand of the best workmen.

Any person willing to treat for the purchase of this invaluable invention, may hear the terms by applying to J. Davenport, at John Baker’s Hotel, Water-street.

Wanted, A Partner, who will find it advantageous.

While reading away on Mr. Davenport I couldn’t help but notice how his inventions on spinning and carding wool helped our struggling young nation. Because England was taxing the begeezus out of the colonies the Americans revolted as we all know. During this time England practically cut off textile imports and the Americans boycotted anything from England anyway making Davenports textile inventions quite the news in its day.

That was until the greatest textile related patent on March,14^th 1794.
Any guesses as to what it was?

Let’s make it fun… For anyone who comments below with the correct answer I’ll put your name in a drawing for a surprise handmade goody. Drawing will be held on Saturday 2-19-2011

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Naturally the ultimate question is what have I been up to this FAF? Well things have settled down finally and I’ve been hard at work on my shawl which has turned into a shawlette since I ran out of yarn (drat!). I wasn’t happy with any of the patterns I found so I ended up winging it. Thankfully I wrote everything down so I’ll eventually have the pattern posted sometime next week.

Here’s a photo of the shawlette finished yet un blocked.

New on my needles now a funky sock yarn shawl. Being sock yarn I expect I’ll be at this one quite a while even with #6 needles.

Check out the folks below for more for fiber goodies.

February 11, 2011

Fiber Arts Friday – TGIFF

TIGIFF! Thank Goodness It’s Fiber Friday

I’m more excited that it’s Friday than anything else. It has been a long and stressful week. This week I was running solo and I’m so thankful to have M.back. Juggling farm chores, house chores, manly chores, puppy chores, cat chores, hay bales, plowing, shoveling, coal stove maintenance, oh yeah and then there’s the day job as well as being OnCall for the day job. I’m beat!

I hardly got anything done for my fiber fun this week. I present to you the very beginning of the green/gold shawl. Question: does anyone know a tip for getting the twist out of new set of circular needles? The darn thing keeps curling on itself and its driving me nutty.

On a unrelated note I joined a gym. I’ve crested over the 200lb making me now 40lbs over the weight I was happiest at. So, I’m testing a gym out for the next month. I’ve never gone before so it is all new to me. My goal: Make an honest attempt to go every day for 1 hour. So far, I’ve only missed 1 day this week due to that darn OnCall phone. Argh. I wonder how the gym would like it if I’m using a computer and chatting away on the phone while using the treadmill?

February 4, 2011February 3, 2011

Fiber Arts Friday – Pay It Forward

Welcome back to Fiber Arts Friday.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock you’re probably aware there was a snow event this week. I know many of you fiber folks were stuck home and were probably enjoying some down time with your spinning and knitting.

Unfortunately for me, I work for a utility and like the post office, wind, rain nor snow will close my office and I am expected to trek in no matter the road closures. Even with moping around at work and wishing I was home I did manage to get some fiber time in. Since the week was stressful I found my fiber time very relaxing.

If you follow Wonder Why Gal or myself on Facebook you know that a while back we offered a fiber pay it forward. For the first 5 people that responded to our posts we would hand make an item for them and in return the recipient should make an item for another 5 people. For me to make items I need yarn so I’ve been working at spinning away. I have 3 bobbins going all with different yarn.

Green/Gold – Superwash Merino / Tencel blend – Hope to make a shawl out of this
Gray – Himalayan Cat / Tencel – Yup, I’m still spinning up even more yarn for my friend
Beige – Alpaca / Mystery Wool / Tencel – Not sure what this will be yet

I’m also working on my first ever knitted scarf. Just something simple but with some of my spun single ply yarn with some fun colors I used to keep it interesting looking.

I twisted up some cord and braided a custom dog leash for Wonder Why Gal’s miniature schnauzers which I’m hoping they both enjoy. I also crochet up a little something for her too since she was one of my hand made gift recipients. Sorry no photos, I don’t want to ruin the surprise!

January 28, 2011January 28, 2011

Fiber Arts Friday – Alpaca Fiber Tensile Strength

My fiber week was spent back to what I like doing the most. Making ropes for mecate reins, leashes or lead ropes and of course my fiber of choice is alpaca. But why?

When I got into raising alpacas everyone told me how much better alpaca fiber was for one reason or another and I wanted to do the research and find out if folks were just blowing smoke up my @$$ or not. It turns out there was hardly any research done and I only could find 1 article done by the Yocom-McColl Testing lab, Texas A&M and University of Wyoming entitled “Fiber Characteristics of US Huacaya Alpacas.”

I specifically wanted to learn about fiber strength. I was not interested in crimp, color, diameter, or any other characteristic unless it directly affected the strength of the fiber.

First and foremost; how is strength calculated and what is is the minimum needed for today’s high speed mill industry? Strength is calculated in Newtons/kilotex (N/ktex) and is the force measured in Newtons required to break a staple of given thickness measured in kilotex. Mother Earth exerts 9.8 Newtons(1kg x 9.8m/s²) and kilotex is the thickness in terms of mass per unit length (kg/km).

Today’s milling industry requires fiber with a minimum of 30N/ktex tensile strength for processing.

Wool

Wool fiber has a direct correlation between fiber diameter and staple strength. So much so that Australia research actually has come up with a formula for breeders to follow to improve upon tensile strength. They can use the CV_D(Coefficient Variation Standard Deviation) from fiber reports to improve upon N/ktex. Breeding for a CV_Dof 19% or lower creates a stronger wool fiber. In other words, say your ewe’s mean micron count is 20, breeding to stay within 19% of 20 is ideal for fiber strength. Wool breeders aiming for this CV_D, results in producing wool with 30-38 N/ktex.

Huacaya Alpaca Fiber

As it turns out alpaca fiber is extremely strong and has no correlation to color, fiber diameter, or length. It is naturally strong fiber! So much so that further studies on its strength aren’t even bothered with because 90% of fiber tested scored higher than the 30N/ktex required for the milling industry. The mean tensile strength of alpaca is 50N/ktex. The one study I found back in 1997 for Suri show’s their fiber strength to be 44.4N/ktex. I’m now hearing reports that Suri is stronger than Huacaya due to recent breeding practices but I have not been able to find recent research supporting this claim.

One thing when reading through this study that I did notice, is that alpaca fiber strength seems to increase dramatically with animals raised in the Great Lakes and Northeast regions. I’m not sure if it’s the cold weather, snow, or forage that the alpaca fiber seems to like, but animals in these regions score and average of 56.25N/ktex. Alpacas from the central, south and western regions scored an average of 47.26N/ktex. Fiber Diameter does not appear to affect the strength at all over the regions.

	Great Lakes/North East	Central, South and West	% difference
Average Strength N/ktex	56.25	47.26	15.98%
Average Diameter µm	29.6	27.9	5.7 %

The study does show that alpaca is also nicer than most wools in that the longer the fiber length does not mean courser fiber. In fact it tends to be reversed. The longer the alpaca fiber the finer the micron count and again fiber strength does not appear to be an issue. Long, fine, short or course alpaca scores above the required 30N/ktex every time.

I hope I didn’t bore you too much and I guess to sum everything up; alpaca is STRONG!

So what have I been doing with my superior strength alpaca? Making ropes of course.
here are some photos of the crazy process I go through to make the 6’ braided dog leashes pictured here.

Shameless Plug… These 2 leashes are available for purchase!

FREE SHIPPING to any Fiber Arts Friday reader who would like to buy one.

Use coupon code: FAF

Note these are big dog leashes… 5/8″ dimeter. If you’d like a narrower leash I can make one custom for you.

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