Hi all,
For those of you who own an Ashford drum carder with fine cloth (72 ppi),
can you tell me how well it works on really fine wool? I'm talking fine
like Cormo, Polwarth, Merino, and Corriedale. Also, what about on
"exotics" - angora, alpaca, mohair, etc? Blending? I've searched the
archives, but it seems precious few of us have the Ashford or have anything
to say about it!
I've gotten a deal... I think!... on a used Fricke carder. It's a
motorized doublewide with the 72 ppi cloth on the large drum, same as the
Ashford fine. I'm wondering whether I will really need to upgrade to fine
cloth (128 ppi) to do the fibers I like to use.
Anyway, the carder seems to be ~15? years old. It's being crated and sent
up to the total tune of about a little over $700. It's going to require
some new parts (the supports to adjust the drum, $30), and of course, I
don't have a lot of money left to put into it. (I've been very good at
raising the money for this carder by, gulp, selling stash!) I figured I'd
spend $850, which would have been the price of a brand new Fricke Finest
doublewide - and means I have about $100 left in the budget.
I talked to Otto Strauch, maker of Fricke carders (thanks to those of you
who sent me his contact info), who told me how much it would be to recloth
the small drum w/slicker-licker cloth ($90), buy a new large drum with fine
cloth ($330), recloth the current large drum with fine cloth ($244), and
purchase a Duncan brush ($96).
Reclothing or replacing the large drum is obviously not an option here, it
will take me a few months to save up the $$$ for it. I've seen on the
spinning barter page a hint on using a wallpaper brush to "impersonate" the
Duncan brush. Anyone try it? Does it work?
If the small drum doesn't have the slicker-licker, I guess that and the
supports need to be replaced first. But I'm not sure - is the fine cloth
drum really necessary? Is the Duncan brush really necessary? Strauch
assured me that having both would, ultimately, be the best thing for me.
He also said that it would be better to recloth the large drum to fine,
rather than having two drums, as the fine cloth can do coarser fibers just
as well as the coarse cloth. He also said it's hard to switch these
interchangeable drums on a motorized carder. Anybody have experience with
this? Better to have two drums or just one?
Thanks for your advice,
-j.
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