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106-692: The spinning wheel was invented in the Islamic world by 1030. It later spread to China by 1090, and then spread from the Islamic world to Europe and India by the 13th century. Until the 1740s all spinning was done by hand using a spinning wheel. The state of the art spinning wheel in England was known as the Jersey wheel however an alternative wheel, the Saxony wheel was a double band treadle spinning wheel where

212-409: A bobbin lasted two days but on fine count it could last for 3 weeks. To creel, the creeler stood behind the mule, placing new bobbins on the shelf above the creel. As the bobbin ran empty he would pick it off its skewer in the creel unreeling 30 cm or so of roving, and drop it into a skip. With his left hand, he would place on the new bobbin onto the skewer from above and with his right hand twist in

318-424: A brush on the roller beam, and run bent double the entire length of the mule, avoiding the rails and draw bands, and not letting themselves touch the yarn sheet. When they had finished they would run to agreed positions of safety where the minder could see both of them, and the minder would unclip the stang and start the mule. Before this ritual was devised, boys had been crushed. The mule was 130 feet (40 m) long,

424-542: A card, which was then wrapped around a cylinder. Lewis' invention was later developed and improved by Richard Arkwright and Samuel Crompton , although the design came under suspicion after a fire at Daniel Bourn's factory in Leominster which used Paul and Wyatt's spindles. Bourn produced a similar patent in the same year. Rev John Dyer of Northampton recognised the importance of the Paul and Wyatt cotton spinning machine in

530-401: A clump of fibres and teasing a bit of them out, then twisting it into a basic string shape. The spinner continues pulling and twisting the yarn in this manner to make it longer and longer while also controlling the thickness. Thousands of years ago, people began doing this onto a stick, called a spindle , which was a very lengthy process. The actual wheel part of a spinning wheel does not take

636-411: A consistent thread; a self-acting mule would need: A counter faller under the thread was made to rise to take in the slack caused by backing off. This could be used with the top faller wire to guide the yarn to the correct place on the cop. These were controlled by levers and cams and an inclined plane called the shaper. The spindle speed was controlled by a drum and weighted ropes, as the headstock moved

742-435: A drive band; instead the flyer is directly friction-driven via a rubber ring in contact at a right angle to the flat surface of a solid drive wheel. One example from New Zealand dates to 1918, and a very few other models using this drive method have been manufactured since 1970. These wheels are extremely compact and less fouled by outdoor dirt than drive-band wheels, but they are quite uncommon. The spinning wheel increased

848-436: A few minutes, the piecers would run the length of the mule gate thrutching five spindles a time, and the doffing involved lifting four cops from the spindles with the right hand and piling them on the left forearm and hand. To get a firm cop bottom, the minder would whip the first few layers of yarn. After the first few draws the minder would stop the mule at the start of an inward run and take it in slowly depressing and releasing

954-473: A great expansion at about the same time, which can be used to identify the start of the Industrial Revolution. The 1790 mule was operated by brute force: the spinner drawing and pushing the frame while attending to each spindle. Home spinning was the occupation of women and girls, but the strength needed to operate a mule caused it to be the activity of men. Hand loom weaving, however, had been

1060-417: A hand to turn the wheel. The great wheel is usually used to spin short-staple fibres (this includes both cotton and wool), and can only be used with fibre preparations that are suited to long-draw spinning. The great wheel is usually over 1.5 metres (5 feet) in height. The large drive wheel turns the much smaller spindle assembly, with the spindle revolving many times for each turn of the drive wheel. The yarn

1166-409: A heck (an apparatus that guides the thread to the reels) in a continuous process. These two wheels became the starting point of technological development. Businessmen such as Richard Arkwright employed inventors to find solutions that would increase the amount of yarn spun, then took out the relevant patents. The spinning jenny allowed a group of eight spindles to be operated together. It mirrored

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1272-525: A low-voltage source, such as a rechargeable battery. Most e-spinners are smaller, more portable, and quieter than treadle wheels. One of the attractions of an e-spinner is that it is not necessary to coordinate treadling with handling the fibre (drafting), so it can be easier to learn to spin on an e-spinner than a traditional treadle-style spinning wheel. E-spinners are also suitable for spinners who have trouble treadling or keeping their treadling speed consistent. This type of treadle-driven wheel does not use

1378-415: A man's occupation but in the mill it could and was done by girls and women. Spinners were the bare-foot aristocrats of the factory system. It replaced decentralised cottage industries with centralised factory jobs, driving economic upheaval and urbanisation . Mule spinners were the leaders in unionism within the cotton industry; the pressure to develop the self-actor or self-acting mule was partly to open

1484-412: A mechanic from Horwich , constructed a mule using toothed gearing and, importantly, metal rollers. Baker of Bury worked on drums, and Hargreaves used parallel scrolling to achieve smoother acceleration and deceleration. In 1790, William Kelly of Glasgow used a new method to assist the draw stroke. First animals, and then water, was used as the prime mover. Wright of Manchester moved the headstock to

1590-532: A mill in Birmingham which used their new rolling machine powered by a donkey , this was not profitable and soon closed. A factory was opened in Northampton in 1743, with fifty spindles turning on five of Paul and Wyatt's machines, proving more successful than their first mill; this operated until 1764. Lewis Paul invented the hand-driven carding machine in 1748. A coat of wire slips were placed around

1696-414: A minute for 56 hours a week. Before the 1770s, textile production was a cottage industry using flax and wool . Weaving was a family activity. The children and women would card the fibre – break up and clean the disorganised fluff into long bundles. The women would then spin these rough rovings into yarn wound onto a spindle . The male weaver would use a frame loom to weave this into cloth. This

1802-542: A minute. It was invented between 1775 and 1779 by Samuel Crompton . The self-acting (automatic) mule was patented by Richard Roberts in 1825. At its peak, there were 5,000,000 mule spindles in Lancashire alone. Modern versions are still in production and are used to spin woollen yarns from noble fibres such as cashmere , ultra-fine merino and alpaca for the knitted textile market. The spinning mule spins textile fibres into yarn by an intermittent process. In

1908-450: A musical treatment of the classical story of Omphale and Heracles . A favorite piano work for students is Albert Ellmenreich's Spinnleidchen (Spinning Song) , from his 1863 Musikalische Genrebilder , Op. 14. An ostinato of repeating melodic fifths represents the spinning wheel. The Spinning Wheel is also the title/subject of a classic Irish folk song by John Francis Waller . A traditional Irish folk song, Túirne Mháire ,

2014-467: A person simply push at a pedal and keep the wheel turning at an even more constant rate. This mechanism was the main source of technological progress for the spinning wheel before the 18th century. The history of the spinning wheel is disputed, with: The spinning wheel spread from the Middle-East to Europe by the 13th century, with the earliest European illustration dated to around 1280. In France,

2120-510: A poem in 1757: A circular machine, of new design In conic shape: it draws and spins a thread Without the tedious toil of needless hands. A wheel invisible, beneath the floor, To ev'ry member of th' harmonius frame, Gives necessary motion. One intent O'erlooks the work; the carded wool, he says, So smoothly lapped around those cylinders, Which gently turning, yield it to yon cirue Of upright spindles, which with rapid whirl Spin out in long extenet an even twine. The spinning jenny

2226-506: A single drive wheel set up in Irish tension, or 'bobbin lead', the drive band drives the bobbin and the tension band brakes the flyer. Some wheels can be set up in either single drive configuration, others only one. Additionally some wheels can be set up either in double drive or single drive. When the spindle or flyer is located above the wheel, rather than off to one side, the wheel is called an upright wheel or castle wheel. This type of wheel

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2332-522: A small, portable, hand-cranked wheel, is ideal for spinning cotton and other fine, short-staple fibres, though it can be used to spin other fibres as well. The size varies, from that of a hardbound novel to the size of a briefcase, to a floor charkha. Leaders of the India's Freedom Struggle brought the charkha into wider use with their teachings. They hoped the charkha would assist the people of India achieve self-sufficiency and independence, and therefore used

2438-422: A spinning wheel. Perhaps surprisingly, a traditional spindle does not have a sharp end that could prick a person's finger (unlike the walking wheel, often used for wool spinning). Despite this, the narrative idea persists that Sleeping Beauty or Briar Rose or Dornrosen pricks her finger on the spindle—a device which she has never seen before, as they have been banned from the kingdom in a forlorn attempt to prevent

2544-541: A spinning wheel. In 1814, Franz Schubert composed " Gretchen am Spinnrade ", a lied for piano and voice based on a poem from Goethe's Faust . the piano part depicts Gretchen's restlessness as she spins on a spinning wheel while waiting by a window for her love to return. Antonín Dvořák composed The Golden Spinning Wheel , a symphonic poem based on the folk ballad from Kytice by Karel Jaromír Erben . Camille Saint-Saëns wrote Le Rouet d'Omphale (Omphale's Spinning Wheel) , symphonic poem in A major, Op. 31,

2650-437: A symbolic identification with the poor of India. His personal choice became a powerful political gesture as he urged his more privileged followers to copy his example and discard—or even burn—their European-style clothing and return with pride to their ancient, pre-colonial culture. Gandhi claimed that spinning thread in the traditional manner also had material advantages, as it would create the basis for economic independence and

2756-442: Is a machine used to spin cotton and other fibres. They were used extensively from the late 18th to the early 20th century in the mills of Lancashire and elsewhere. Mules were worked in pairs by a minder, with the help of two boys: the little piecer and the big or side piecer. The carriage carried up to 1,320 spindles and could be 150 feet (46 m) long, and would move forward and back a distance of 5 feet (1.5 m) four times

2862-455: Is a multi-spool spinning wheel. It was invented circa 1764, its invention attributed to James Hargreaves in Stanhill, near Blackburn , Lancashire. The spinning jenny was essentially an adaptation of the spinning wheel. The Water frame was developed and patented by Arkwright in the 1770s. The roving was attenuated (stretched) by drafting rollers and twisted by winding it onto a spindle. It

2968-443: Is completed. The carriage commences to run inwards; that is, towards the rollerbeam. This is called putting up. The spindles wind on the yarn at a uniform rate. The speed of revolution of the spindle must vary, as the faller is guiding the thread upon the larger or smaller diameter of the cone of the cop. Immediately the winding is finished, the depressed faller rises, the counter-faller is put down. These movements are repeated until

3074-595: Is generally sung in praise of the spinning wheel, but was regarded by Mrs Costelloe , who collected it, as "much corrupted", and may have had a darker narrative. It is widely taught in junior schools in Ireland. Sun Charkhe Di Mithi Mithi Kook is a Sufi song in the Punjabi language inspired by the traditional spinning wheel. It is an ode by a lover as she remembers her beloved with the sound of every spin of her Charkha. Spinning wheels also feature prominently in

3180-503: Is known as "doubling". Spinning wheel A spinning wheel is a device for spinning thread or yarn from fibres . It was fundamental to the cotton textile industry prior to the Industrial Revolution . It laid the foundations for later machinery such as the spinning jenny and spinning frame , which displaced the spinning wheel during the Industrial Revolution. The basic spinning of yarn involves taking

3286-407: Is not a common feature of the treadle wheel. Instead, most modern wheels employ a flyer-and-bobbin system which twists the yarn and winds it onto a spool simultaneously. These wheels can be single- or double-treadle; which is a matter of personal preference and ergonomics and does not materially affect the operation of the wheel. The double drive wheel is named after its drive band, which goes around

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3392-537: Is now employed to spin all counts of yarn. The Throstle frame was a descendant of the water frame. It used the same principles, was better engineered and driven by steam. In 1828 the Danforth throstle frame was invented in the United States. The heavy flyer caused the spindle to vibrate, and the yarn snarled every time the frame was stopped. Not a success. It was named throstle, as the noise it made when running

3498-423: Is often more compact, thus easier to store and transport. Some upright wheels are even made to fold up small enough that they fit in carry-on luggage at the airport. An Irish castle wheel is a type of upright in which the flyer is located below the drive wheel. An electric spinning wheels, or e-spinner, is powered by an electric motor rather than via a treadle. Some require mains power while others may be powered by

3604-433: Is said to have added a treadle , by which the spinner could rotate her spindle with one foot and have both hands free to spin. Leonardo da Vinci drew a picture of the flyer, which twists the yarn before winding it onto the spindle. During the 16th century a treadle wheel with flyer was in common use, and gained such names as the Saxony wheel and the flax wheel. It sped up production, as one need not stop spinning to wind up

3710-457: Is spun at an angle off the tip of the spindle, and is then stored on the spindle. To begin spinning on a great wheel, first a leader (a length of waste yarn) is tied onto the base of the spindle and spiraled up to the tip. Then the spinner overlaps a handful of fibre with the leader, holding both gently together with the left hand, and begins to slowly turn the drive wheel clockwise with the right hand, while simultaneously walking backward and drawing

3816-550: Is spun off the tip of the spindle with the other. The floor charkha and the great wheel closely resemble each other. With both, the spinning must stop in order to wind the yarn onto the spindle. The word charkha , which has links with Persian چرخ ( Romanized : charkh ), wheel, is related to the Sanskrit word for "circle" ( cakra ). The charkha was both a tool and a symbol of the Indian independence movement . The charkha,

3922-479: Is the classic fairy tale Sleeping Beauty , in which the main character pricks her hand or finger on the poisoned spindle of a spinning wheel and falls into a deep sleep following a wicked fairy or witch 's curse. Numerous variations of the tale exist (the Brothers Grimm had one in their collection entitled Little Briar Rose), and in only some of them is the spindle actually attached to/associated with

4028-466: The Fine Spinners & Doublers Association . In 1793, John Kennedy addressed the problem of fine counts. With these counts, the spindles on the return traverse needed to rotate faster than on the outward traverse. He attached gears and a clutch to implement this motion. William Eaton, in 1818, improved the winding of the thread by using two faller wires and performing a backing off at the end of

4134-542: The Luddite riots. The preparatory and associated tasks allowed many children to be employed until this was regulated. Development over the next century and a half led to an automatic mule and to finer and stronger yarn. The ring frame , originating in New England in the 1820s, was little used in Lancashire until the 1890s. It required more energy and could not produce the finest counts. Samuel Crompton invented

4240-743: The Wagner opera The Flying Dutchman ; the second act begins with local girls sitting at their wheels and singing about the act of spinning. Gilbert and Sullivan's The Yeomen of the Guard begins with a solitary character singing while spinning at her wheel, the first of their operettas not to open with a chorus. Spinning wheels may be found as motifs in art around the world, ranging from their status as domestic/utilitarian items to their more symbolic role (such as in India, where they may have political implications). Spinning Mule The spinning mule

4346-402: The spindle and distaff were not displaced until the mid 18th century. The spinning wheel replaced the earlier method of hand spinning with a spindle. The first stage in mechanizing the process was mounting the spindle horizontally so it could be rotated by a cord encircling a large, hand-driven wheel. The great wheel is an example of this type, where the fibre is held in the left hand and

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4452-437: The spinning jenny and spinning frame , which displaced the spinning wheel during the Industrial Revolution. The spinning wheel was a precursor to the spinning jenny , which was widely used during the Industrial Revolution. The spinning jenny was essentially an adaptation of the spinning wheel. The ubiquity of the spinning wheel has led to its inclusion in the art, literature and other expressions of numerous cultures around

4558-404: The spinning mule in 1779, so called because it is a hybrid of Arkwright's water frame and James Hargreaves 's spinning jenny in the same way that a mule is the product of crossbreeding a female horse with a male donkey . The spinning mule has a fixed frame with a creel of cylindrical bobbins to hold the roving, connected through the headstock to a parallel carriage with the spindles. On

4664-500: The 20th century additional mechanisms were added to make the motion more gentle, leading to mules that used two or even three driving speeds. Fine counts needed a softer action on the winding, and relied on manual adjustment to wind the chase or top of the perfect cop. Spinning wool is a different process as the variable lengths of the individual fibres means that they are unsuitable for attenuation by roller drafting. For this reason, woolen fibres are carded using condenser cards which rub

4770-454: The bare spindle below. A few turns are wound onto the spindle, to fix the threads to the bare spindles for a new set. The cops are removed and collected into cans or baskets, and subsequently delivered to the warehouse. The remainder of the "draw" or "stretch," as the length of spun yarn is called when the carriage is out, is then wound upon the spindles as the carriage is run up to the roller beam. Work then commences anew. The doffing took only

4876-412: The blowing room delivered by a bobbin carrier who was part of the carder's staff, and yarn was hoisted down to the warehouse by the warehouseman's staff. Delineation of jobs was rigid and communication would be through the means of coloured slips of paper written on in indelible pencil. Creeling involved replacing the rovings bobbins in a section of the mule without stopping the mule. On very coarse counts

4982-399: The carded fibres together rather than drafting them. They are then spun on mule-type machines which have no roller drafting, but create the draft by the spindles receding from the delivery rollers whilst that latter, having paid out a short length of roving, are held stationary. Such mules are often complex involving multiple spindles speeds, receding motions, etc. to ensure optimum treatment of

5088-600: The centre of the machine, allowing twice as many spindles; a squaring band was added to ensure the spindles came out in a straight line. He was in conversation with John Kennedy about the possibility of a self-acting mule. Kennedy, a partner in McConnell & Kennedy machine makers in Ancoats , was concerned with building ever larger mules. McConnell & Kennedy ventured into spinning when they were left with two unpaid-for mules; their firm prospered and eventually merged into

5194-506: The charkha as a symbol of the Indian independence movement and included it on earlier versions of the Flag of India . The great wheel was one of the earlier types of spinning wheel. The fibre is held in the left hand and the wheel slowly turned with the right. Yarn is spun on a great wheel with the long-draw spinning technique, which requires only one active hand most of the time, thus freeing

5300-409: The cops on each spindle are perfectly formed: the set is completed. A stop-motion paralyses every action of the machine, rendering it necessary to doff or strip the spindles, and to commence anew. Doffing is performed by the piercers thrutching, that is raising, the cops partially up the spindles, whilst the carriage is out. The minder then depressing the faller, so far as to guide the threads upon

5406-536: The curse of the wicked godmother-fairy. Walt Disney included the Saxony or flax wheel in their animated film version of Perrault's tale and Rose pricks her finger on the distaff (which holds the plant fibre waiting to be spun). Whereas only a spindle is used in Tchaikovsky 's ballet The Sleeping Beauty which is closer to the direct translation of the French "un fuseau". Spinning wheels are also integral to

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5512-411: The difference in speed winds the yarn onto the bobbin when the spinner lets up tension on the newly spun yarn, and spins the bobbin and flyer together to add spin to the yarn when the spinner keeps the new yarn under tension (in this case, the drive band will slip slightly in the groove in the bobbin, flyer whorl, or both). Generally the speed difference or "ratio" is adjusted by the size of the whorls and

5618-412: The drafting rollers, drawing them through the 1 + 1 ⁄ 4 -inch (3.2 cm) gap between two ends, stripping them of fly and replacing them on the next inward run. Cleaning the carriage top was far more dangerous. The minder would stop the mule on the outward run, and raise his hands above his head. The piecers would enter under the yarn sheet with a scavenger cloth on the carriage spindle rail and

5724-497: The draw stroke, the roving is pulled through rollers and twisted; on the return it is wrapped onto the spindle. Its rival, the throstle frame or ring frame , uses a continuous process, where the roving is drawn, twisted and wrapped in one action. The mule was the most common spinning machine from 1790 until about 1900 and was still used for fine yarns until the early 1980s. In 1890, a typical cotton mill would have over 60 mules, each with 1,320 spindles, which would operate four times

5830-455: The expiry of the patent other firms took forward the development, and the mule was adapted for the counts it spun. Initially Roberts' self-actor was used for coarse counts (Oldham Counts), but the mule-jenny continued to be used for the very finest counts (Bolton counts) until the 1890s and beyond. Bolton specialised in fine count cotton, and its mules ran more slowly to put in the extra twist. The mule jenny allowed for this gentler action but in

5936-448: The faller wire several times. Alternatively, a starch paste could be skilfully applied to the first few layers of yarn by the piecers – and later a small paper tube was dropped over spindle – this slowed down the doffing operation and extra payment was negotiated by the minders. A pair of mules would be manned by a person called the minder and two boys called the side piecer and the little piecer. They worked barefoot in humid temperatures;

6042-405: The fibre in the left hand away from the spindle at an angle. The left hand must control the tension on the wool to produce an even result. Once a sufficient amount of yarn has been made, the spinner turns the wheel backward a short distance to unwind the spiral on the spindle, then turns it clockwise again, and winds the newly made yarn onto the spindle, finishing the wind-on by spiralling back out to

6148-528: The frame. Both the rollers and the outward motion of the carriage remove irregularities from the rove before it is wound on the spindle. When Arkwright's patents expired, the mule was developed by several manufacturers. Crompton's first mule had 48 spindles and could produce 1 pound (0.45 kg) of 60s thread a day. This demanded a spindle speed of 1,700  rpm, and a power input of 1 ⁄ 16 horsepower (47 W). The mule produced strong, thin yarn , suitable for any kind of textile , warp or weft. It

6254-404: The minder and the little piecer worked the minder half of the mule. The minder would make minor adjustments to his mules to the extent that each mule worked differently. They were specialists in spinning, and were answerable only to the gaffer and under-gaffer who were in charge of the floor and with it the quantity and quality of the yarn that was produced. Bobbins of rovings came from the carder in

6360-419: The minder's eyesight might not have been good, the air in the mill was clouded with fly and another minder's boys might have been mistaken for his. The ritual became encoded in law. The spinning inventions were significant in enabling a great expansion to occur in the production of textiles, particularly cotton ones. Cotton and iron were leading sectors in the Industrial Revolution . Both industries underwent

6466-486: The multiple rollers required much more energy input and demanded that the device be driven by a water wheel. The early water frame, however, had only a single spindle. Combining ideas from these two system inspired the spinning mule . The increased supply of muslin inspired developments in loom design such as Edmund Cartwright 's power loom . Some spinners and handloom weavers opposed the perceived threat to their livelihood: there were frame-breaking riots and, in 1811–13,

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6572-410: The new roving into the tail of the last. Piecing involved repairing sporadic yarn breakages. At the rollers, the broken yarn would be caught on the underclearer (or fluker rod on Bolton mules), while at the spindle it would knot itself into a whorl on the spindle tip. If the break happened on the winding stroke the spindle might have to be stopped while the thread was found. The number of yarn breakages

6678-436: The newly spun thread. The rival machine, the throstle frame or ring frame was a continuous process, where the roving was drawn twisted and wrapped in one action. The spinning mule became self-acting (automatic) in 1830s. The mule was the most common spinning machine from 1790 until about 1900, but was still used for fine yarns until the 1960s. A cotton mill in 1890 would contain over 60 mules, each with 1320 spindles. Between

6784-471: The newly spun yarn is wound onto the spindle in the form of a cone-shaped cop. As the mule spindle travels on its carriage, the roving which it spins is fed to it through rollers geared to revolve at different speeds to draw out the yarn. Marsden in 1885 described the processes of setting up and operating a mule. Here is his description, edited slightly. The creel holds bobbins containing rovings . The rovings are passed through small guide-wires, and between

6890-417: The outward motion, the rovings are paid out through attenuating rollers and twisted. On the return, the roving is clamped and the spindles are reversed to take up the newly spun thread. Crompton built his mule from wood. Although he used Hargreaves' ideas of spinning multiple threads and of attenuating the roving with rollers, it was he who put the spindles on the carriage and fixed a creel of roving bobbins on

6996-527: The outward traverse. All these mules had been worked by the strength of the operatives. The next improvement was a fully automatic mule. Richard Roberts took out his first patent in 1825 and a second in 1830. The task he had set himself was to design a self-actor, a self-acting or automatic spinning mule. Roberts is also known for the Roberts Loom , which was widely adopted because of its reliability. The mule in 1820 still needed manual assistance to spin

7102-448: The past has made us dependent on England, and the only way we can rid ourselves of the dependence is to boycott all goods made by machinery. This is why we have made it the patriotic duty of every Indian to spin his own cotton and weave his own cloth." The Golden Spinning Wheel (Zlatý kolovrat) is a Czech poem by Karel Jaromír Erben that was included in his classic collection of folk ballads , Kytice . Rumpelstiltskin , one of

7208-480: The place of the spindle; instead, it automates the twisting process, allowing one to "twist" the thread without having to constantly do so manually, and also the size of the wheel lets one more finely control the amount of twist. The thread still ends up on a spindle, just as it did before the invention of the wheel. The wheel itself was originally free-moving, spun by a hand or foot reaching out and turning it directly. Eventually, simple mechanisms were created that let

7314-510: The plot or characterization in the Scottish folk tale Habitrot and the German tales The Three Spinners and The Twelve Huntsmen . Louisa May Alcott , most famous as the author of Little Women , wrote a collection of short stories called Spinning-Wheel Stories , which were not about spinning wheels but instead meant to be read while engaging in the rather tedious act of using

7420-478: The possibility of survival for India’s impoverished rural areas. This commitment to traditional cloth making was also part of a larger swadeshi movement , which aimed for the boycott of all British goods. As Gandhi explained to Charlie Chaplin in 1931, the return to spinning did not mean a rejection of all modern technology but of the exploitative and controlling economic and political system in which textile manufacture had become entangled. Gandhi said, “Machinery in

7526-662: The production of cotton cloth, his invention becoming known as the water frame. More modern spinning machines use a mechanical means to rotate the spindle, as well as an automatic method to draw out fibres, and devices to work many spindles together at speeds previously unattainable. Newer technologies that offer even faster yarn production include friction spinning, an open-end system, and air jets. Numerous types of spinning wheels exist, including: Spinning yarn on any spinning wheel requires prepared fibre; excepting silk, which can be spun directly from unwound cocoons, fibres must be prepared for spinning, usually by combing or carding. At

7632-407: The productivity of thread making by a factor of greater than 10. Medieval historian Lynn Townsend White Jr. credited the spinning wheel with increasing the supply of rags, which led to cheap paper , which in turn was a factor in the development of printing . It was fundamental to the cotton textile industry prior to the Industrial Revolution . It laid the foundations for later machinery such as

7738-446: The ropes twisted the drum, which using a tooth wheel turned the spindles. None of this would have been possible using the technology of Crompton's time, fifty years earlier. With the invention of the self actor, the hand-operated mule was increasingly referred to as a mule-jenny. Oldham counts refers to the medium thickness cotton that was used for general purpose cloth. Roberts did not profit from his self-acting spinning mule, but on

7844-405: The side-to-side weft does not have to be stretched on a loom in the way that the warp is, it can generally be less strong.) The throstle and the later water frame pulled the rovings through a set of attenuating rollers. Spinning at differing speeds, these pulled the thread continuously while other parts twisted it as it wound onto the heavy spindles. This produced thread suitable for warp, but

7950-413: The simple wheel; the rovings were clamped, and a frame moved forward stretching and thinning the roving. A wheel was rapidly turned as the frame was pushed back, and the spindles rotated, twisting the rovings into yarn and collecting it on the spindles. The spinning jenny was effective and could be operated by hand, but it produced weaker thread that could be used only for the weft part of the cloth. (Because

8056-530: The spindle rotated faster than the traveller in a ratio of 8:6, drawing on both was done by the spinners fingers. In 1738 Lewis Paul and John Wyatt of Birmingham patented the Roller Spinning machine and the flyer-and-bobbin system, for drawing cotton to a more even thickness, using two sets of rollers that travelled at different speeds. This principle was the basis of Richard Arkwright 's later water frame design. By 1742 Paul and Wyatt had opened

8162-401: The spindle, and, as it approaches the tenuity of the remainder, it receives the twist it had hitherto refused to take. The carriage, which is borne upon wheels, continues its outward progress, until it reaches the extremity of its traverse, which is 63 inches (160 cm) from the roller beam. The revolution of the spindles cease, the drawing rollers stop. Backing-off commences. This process is

8268-401: The spindles, revolving at a rate of 6,000–9,000 rpm twist the hitherto loose fibres together, thus forming a thread. Whilst this is going on, the spindle carriage is being drawn away from the rollers, at a pace very slightly exceeding the rate at which the roving is coming forth. This is called the gain of the carriage, its purpose being to eliminate all irregularities in the fineness of

8374-459: The spinner loosens their tension on the newly spun yarn, the bobbin and flyer spin relative to each other and the yarn is wound onto the bobbin. A tighter tension band increases relative torque and 'pulls' the yarn onto the bobbin more forcefully; a looser tension band 'pulls' the yarn more gently. Generally, the tension band is tighter for spinning thicker yarn or yarn with less twist, and looser for spinning thinner yarn or yarn with more twist. For

8480-411: The spinning wheel twice. The drive band turns the flyer, which is the horse-shoe shaped piece of wood surrounding the bobbin , as well as the bobbin. Due to a difference in the size of the whorls (the round pieces or pulleys around which the drive band runs) the bobbin whorl, which has a smaller radius than the flyer whorl, turns slightly faster. Thus both the flyer and bobbin rotate to twist the yarn, and

8586-418: The strong smooth yarns needed to create warp for weaving. Spinning wheels ultimately did not develop the capability to spin a variety of yarns until the beginning of the 19th century and the mechanization of spinning. In general, the spinning technology was known for a long time before being adopted by the majority of people, thus making it hard to fix dates of the improvements. In 1533, a citizen of Brunswick

8692-475: The tales collected by the Brothers Grimm , revolves around a woman who is imprisoned under threat of execution unless she can spin straw into gold . Rumpelstiltskin helps her with this task, ultimately at the cost of her first-born child; however, she makes a new bargain with him and is able to keep her child after successfully guessing his name. Another folk tale that incorporates spinning wheels

8798-472: The tension of the drive band. The drive band on the double drive wheel is generally made from a non-stretch cotton or hemp yarn or twine. A single drive wheel set up in Scotch tension has one drive band connecting the drive wheel to the flyer. The spinning drive wheel turns the flyer and, via friction with the flyer shaft, the bobbin. A short tension band, or brake band, adds drag to the bobbin such that when

8904-402: The thread. Should a thick place in the roving come through the rollers, it would resist the efforts of the spindle to twist it; and, if passed in this condition, it would seriously deteriorate the quality of the yarn, and impede subsequent operations. As, however, the twist, spreading itself over the level thread, gives firmness to this portion, the thick and untwisted part yields to the draught of

9010-475: The threads as spun by the ring frame or the mule are ready for the manufacturer; but where extra strength or smoothness is required, as in threads for sewing, crocheting, hosiery, lace and carpets; also where multicoloured effects are needed, as in Grandrelle, or some special form of irregularity, as in corkscrewed, and knopped yarns, two or more single threads are compounded and twisted together. This operation

9116-404: The threads on the spindles, by simply placing the threads in contact with the un-twisted roving. The different parts of the machine are next simultaneously started, when the whole works in harmony together. The back rollers pull the sliver from the bobbins, and passing it to the succeeding pairs, whose differential speeds attenuate it to the required degree of fineness. As it is delivered in front,

9222-426: The three pairs of drawing-rollers. Connection is then established between the attenuated rovings and the spindles. When the latter are bare, as in a new mule, the spindle-driving motion is put into gear, and the attendants wind upon each spindle a short length of yarn from a cop held in the hand. The drawing-roller motion is placed in gear, and the rollers soon present lengths of attenuated roving. These are attached to

9328-450: The thumb. Doffing has already been described. Cleaning was important and until a formal ritual had been devised it was a dangerous operation. The vibration in a mule threw a lot of short fibres (or fly) into the air. It tended to accumulate on the carriage behind the spindles and in the region of the drafting rollers. Piking the stick meant placing the hand though the yarnsheet, and unclipping two sticks of underclearer rollers from beneath

9434-429: The tip again to make another draw. This type of wheel is powered by the spinner's foot rather than their hand or a motor. The spinner sits and pumps a foot treadle that turns the drive wheel via a crankshaft and a connecting rod. This leaves both hands free for drafting the fibres, which is necessary in the short draw spinning technique, which is often used on this type of wheel. The old-fashioned pointed driven spindle

9540-407: The trade to women. It was in 1870 that the first national union was formed. The wool industry was divided into woollen and worsted . It lagged behind cotton in adopting new technology. Worsted tended to adopt Arkwright water frames which could be operated by young girls, and woollen adopted the mule. Circa 1900 there was a high incidence of scrotal cancer detected in former mule spinners. It

9646-410: The unwinding of the several turns of the yarn, extending from the top of the cop in process of formation to the summit of the spindle. As this proceeds, the faller- wire, which is placed over and guides the threads upon the cop, is depressed ; the counter-faller at the same time rising, the slack unwound from the spindles is taken up, and the threads are prevented from running into snarls. Backing-off

9752-403: The very least, foreign matter (dirt, plant stalks, or animal manure) must be removed before spinning. Most handspinners spin from 'a fluffy mass of aligned fibers' to more easily produce a consistent yarn. The tabletop or floor charkha is one of the oldest known forms of the spinning wheel. The charkha works similarly to the great wheel, with a drive wheel being turned by one hand, while the yarn

9858-562: The wheel slowly turned with the right. Holding the fibre at a slight angle to the spindle produced the necessary twist. The spun yarn was then wound onto the spindle by moving it so as to form a right angle with the spindle. This type of wheel, while known in Europe by the 14th century, was not in general use until later. The construction of the Great Wheel made it very good at creating long drawn soft fuzzy wools, but very difficult to create

9964-491: The world, and in the case of South Asia it has become a powerful political symbol. Starting in 1931, the traditional spinning wheel became the primary symbol on the flag of the Provisional Government of Free India. Mahatma Gandhi ’s manner of dress and commitment to hand spinning were essential elements of his philosophy and politics. He chose the traditional loincloth as a rejection of Western culture and

10070-423: The yarn. Condenser spinning was developed to enable the short fibres produced as waste from the combing of fine cottons, to be spun into a soft, coarse yarns suitable for sheeting, blankets etc. Only approximately 2% of the mule spindles in Lancashire were Condenser spindles, but many more Condenser mules survive today as these were the last spindles regularly at work., and the mules are similar. Helmshore Mills

10176-518: The yarn. According to Mark Elvin , 14th-century Chinese technical manuals describe an automatic water-powered spinning wheel. Comparable devices were not developed in Europe until the 18th century. However, it fell into disuse when fibre production shifted from hemp to cotton . It was forgotten by the 17th century. The decline of the automatic spinning wheel in China is an important part of Elvin's high level equilibrium trap theory to explain why there

10282-464: The years 1824 and 1830 Richard Roberts invented a mechanism that rendered all parts of the mule self-acting, regulating the rotation of the spindles during the inward run of the carriage. The Platt Brothers , based in Oldham , Greater Manchester were amongst the most prominent machine makers in this field of work. At first this machine was only used to spin coarse and low-to-medium counts, but it

10388-414: Was a cotton waste mule spinning mill. Mules are still in use for spinning woolen and alpaca, and being produced across the world. In Italy for example by Bigagli and Cormatex Mule spindles rest on a carriage that travels on a track a distance of 60 inches (1.5 m), while drawing out and spinning the yarn. On the return trip, known as putting up, as the carriage moves back to its original position,

10494-489: Was compared to the song of the throstle (thrush). The Ring frame is credited to John Thorp in Rhode Island in 1828/9 and developed by Mr. Jencks of Pawtucket, Rhode Island , who ( Marsden 1884 ) names as the inventor. The bobbins or tubes may be filled from "cops", "ring spools" or "hanks", but a stop motion is required for each thread, which will come into operation immediately a fracture occurs. For many purposes,

10600-407: Was dependent on the quality of the roving, and quality cotton led to fewer breakages. Typical 1,200 spindle mules of the 1920s would experience 5 to 6 breakages a minute. The two piecers would thus need to repair the thread within 15 to 20 seconds while the mule was in motion but once they had the thread it took under three seconds. The repair actually involved a slight rolling of the forefinger against

10706-399: Was first used to spin cotton, then other fibres. Samuel Crompton could not afford to patent his invention. He sold the rights to David Dale and returned to weaving. Dale patented the mule and profited from it. Crompton's machine was largely built of wood, using bands and pulleys for the driving motions. After his machine was public, he had little to do with its development. Henry Stones,

10812-572: Was heavy large scale machine that needed to be driven by power, which in the late 18th century meant by a water wheel. Cotton mills were designed for the purpose by Arkwright, Jedediah Strutt and others along the River Derwent in Derbyshire . Water frames could only spin left. The spinning mule or mule jenny was created in 1779 by Samuel Crompton . It was a combination of Arkwright's water frame and Hargreaves ' spinning jenny . It

10918-409: Was limited to cotton mule spinners and did not affect woollen or condenser mule spinners. The cause was attributed to the blend of vegetable and mineral oils used to lubricate the spindles. The spindles, when running, threw out a mist of oil at crotch height, that was captured by the clothing of anyone piecing an end. In the 1920s much attention was given to this problem. Mules had used this mixture since

11024-623: Was no indigenous Industrial Revolution in China despite its high levels of wealth and scientific knowledge. On the eve of the Industrial Revolution it took at least five spinners to supply one weaver. Lewis Paul and John Wyatt first worked on the problem in 1738, patenting the Roller Spinning machine and the flyer-and-bobbin system, for drawing wool to a more even thickness. Using two sets of rollers that travelled at different speeds, yarn could be twisted and spun quickly and efficiently. However, they did not have much financial success. In 1771, Richard Arkwright used waterwheels to power looms for

11130-407: Was so named because it was a hybrid of these two machines. The mule consisted of a fixed frame containing a creel of bobbins holding the roving, connected through the headstock to a parallel carriage containing the spindles. It used an intermittent process: On the outward traverse, the rovings were paid out, and twisted, and the return traverse, the roving was clamped and the spindles reversed taking up

11236-411: Was then tentered in the sun to bleach it. The invention by John Kay of the flying shuttle made the loom twice as productive, causing the demand for cotton yarn to vastly exceed what traditional spinners could supply. There were two types of spinning wheel: the simple wheel , which uses an intermittent process, and the more refined Saxony wheel, which drives a differential spindle and flyer with

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