Every time I've had a fleece feel sticky at some point after washing
it's been because I didn't use hot enough water (160F or higher is best,
essential with Merino and its derivatives) or enough detergent (I've
found I need 1 cup of liquid dishwashing detergent per 2 pounds of wool).
I've washed 10-year-old raw Merino fleeces and had no stickiness
afterward IF I followed my guidelines :) I've had recently-shorn
primitive Shetland be sticky if I didn't.
I never ever use laundry detergent on wool. Think about it....made to
wash cottons primarily, which like alkali. Wool is damaged by alkali.
Also, wool is full of grease, which unless you're an auto mechanic, your
clothes probably aren't :) At any rate, when I wash cottons that got
grease spots on them from cooking something, the grease doesn't come out
without pretreatment. The proof is in the wool...the one time I used
laundry detergent to wash wool, it felt noticeably harsher afterwards.
And a vinegar rinse isn't going to be able to undo the damage to wool
during washing. All it can do is neutralize some of the residue that
didn't rinse out.
I've been washing wool for 20 years this year--round about May,
probably, as I started spinning with carded wool in March 1986. My
first full fleece to wash was a lovely Perendale. I made the mistake of
believing what I read in old handspinning books about washing wool, and
trying to adapt it to my situation. The result was I got enough
spinnable wool out of a whole fleece to make ONE hat--which I still use
as a barn hat, and it still looks like when I finished it.
Perendale is lovely wool :)
Holly
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