Inevitable
I've seen the spindles for sale made from bead whorls and chopsticks. Some are quite beautiful, but they seem pricey. I had a few semi-precious gemstone donuts in the bead stash, so I made a set:
These are three 40mm donuts and one 50mm donut. I purchased the grommets and chopsticks, but had the wire to make the hooks: I think a bit of better glue might be in order, but for this trial I used craft glue. The finished spindles all weigh less than an ounce: most are .7 of an ounce, much within my current preferred weight range.
I tried them out with bleached tussah, and they are all good spinners. The 50 mm seems to spin the best: I don't know if it's the size of the donut, or something about the relationship of the whorl to the shaft. Should I just happen to be in a bead store soon, I will stick to 50 mm donuts should I just happen to purchase any more......
These are about $6 each to make. The spindles for sale online have much prettier stone whorls, so I will probably be haunting bead stores again, looking. There are some beautiful options at online bead shops too. Always fun to have a particular quest when shopping..... :)
These are three 40mm donuts and one 50mm donut. I purchased the grommets and chopsticks, but had the wire to make the hooks: I think a bit of better glue might be in order, but for this trial I used craft glue. The finished spindles all weigh less than an ounce: most are .7 of an ounce, much within my current preferred weight range.
I tried them out with bleached tussah, and they are all good spinners. The 50 mm seems to spin the best: I don't know if it's the size of the donut, or something about the relationship of the whorl to the shaft. Should I just happen to be in a bead store soon, I will stick to 50 mm donuts should I just happen to purchase any more......
These are about $6 each to make. The spindles for sale online have much prettier stone whorls, so I will probably be haunting bead stores again, looking. There are some beautiful options at online bead shops too. Always fun to have a particular quest when shopping..... :)
posted by Sara at 5:33 PM
5 Comments:
Very nice! You should have quite the collection by the spindle retreat. :-)
Slope. Slippery. Downhill fast.
Which is totally appropriate right now, I suppose. So, your Ravelympics goal is to make one thousand stone whorl spindles, correct?
Yep, that idea is hard to resist. I did the same using double pointed needles to make support spindles back in Nov. Two of them I love, they spin like a dream. One is a black sparkly donut similar to yours. But the lapis stone is not balanced...it just spins okay.
From the lapis and test driving stone spindles at fiber shows, I've come to the conclusion that not all stones are balanced. But I haven't figured out how one would determine that before investing.
Now I want to try the chopsticks and hooks to make a free spinning spindle. Yours are so pretty! Amazing how addicting this is, isn't it?
oh yes, the possibilities are endless....
Very nice looking hooks!
Those are lovely. What do you use as a plug to fill in between the donut and shaft?
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