The Louet Victoria

 

Now that I have had the pleasure of Béatrice's company for a week I thought it time to give a preliminary assessment.

While somewhat petite, she seems nonetheless to be more than capable of anything I ask her to spin. Well, ok, that's an exageration - all I have tried so far is some laceweight. Want to see? I started off on the highest ratio - 14:1. As noted in the information leaflet, the highest ratio can be a bit harder to treadle, so I opted for the middle ratio of 9:1. When I began treadling the action was a bit clunky and I felt a little disappointed. However, as Béatrice and I get to know each other, her action is becoming more and more smooth.

The orrifice features a plastic bush which can be removed if a bulkier yarn is required, but that remains in situ at the moment as I am trying to spinning the laceweight that you can see in the picture above. At a later date there will be a high speed flyer available, which I may order, depending how I get on with 14:1 ratio.

The wheel came with three bobbins and a lazy kate. And it also comes without the need to lubricate - ever, which is handy. Well, if you really want to you can apply a little Vaseline to the bobbins if they get a bit stiff*

You might notice the yellow paper behind the bobbin? Well, as you know, B is a portable wheel, and I intend taking her all over the place with me. I can, however, foresee one little problem....the tensioner for the Scotch tension is quite pronounced, more so than the leather carry handle - to the extent that it looks like this may well be the way the wheel should be picked up. I have visions of some helpful person trying to move my wheel when I am away for a coffee. Hence the yellow 'This is not a handle' notice....

The fibre that I am currently spinning up was brought over by an international enabler from Canada (yep, Lilith's mum. As I still can't spin finely enough to get a really fine plied laceweight I have decided that this yarn will be a singles. To help it hold together in any weaker spots, I am going to whack the living daylights out of it - when it is wet from it's soapy bath, I'll whack it really hard against the bath. This causes a very slight 'felting'. Should be just the job to knit the Icarus Shawl in. *wow, can you imagine what kind of hits I'm gonna get - orrfice, lubrication, Vaseline.....