Assuming each of the five singles are the same thickness and have about the same amount of twist in them, it's not necessary to wet and dry them after plying to find out if the plying twist is balanced or not. Just look (with a pick glass if necessary, 10X magnification) at the individual fibers within the singles. If those fibers are running parallel to the length of the yarn, it's balanced. If they slant in one direction or another, then it needs more or less plying twist to bring them into that straight up-and-down with-the-yarn position.
For details, see: <http://hjsstudio.com/balance.html> It works for any yarn where the individual plies all have about the same amount of twist and thickness. Fiber content doesn't matter, although of course the fiber content will affect the performance of the finished yarn, whether balanced or not. It also works for cabled yarns, there's just the extra step of *over* plying singles, then plying the plies, but you still aim for the fibers in the singles to be parallel with the final yarn. Doesn't work for a lot of novelty plying, as those by definition in many cases are meant to be working with varieties of twist, so something will always be not balanced in the final yarn, though hopefully not so unbalanced it's not usable. Holly
