Washable wool

[Pleater]

Has anyone come across a tartan or kilt fabric made from wool treated to be washable?

I was just doing a bit of tidying up and came across a ball of woolen yarn marked 'washable' and I suddenly wondered if there is a mill anywhere using wool yarns treated to be washable.

I do quite a bit of knitting, and am old enough to remember wool garments getting into the washing machine by accident and coming out all felted and shrunk. Nowadays, if you get the right yarn and use the right program woolens can be machine washed with no ill effects.

So - is there such a thing as a washable tartan fabric?

Anne the Pleater :ootd:

[JimB]

You can't really get sheep wet can you? I think they shrink up and their eyes bulge a little bit

Seriously. I wash wool all the time. kilts, suit pants, etc. Just forget about the machine. Use cold water in a clean sink, Woolite, let it air dry and press with a steam iron. Works every time.

[Ancienne Alliance]

You can't really get sheep wet can you? I think they shrink up and their eyes bulge a little bit

Seriously. I wash wool all the time. kilts, suit pants, etc. Just forget about the machine. Use cold water in a clean sink, Woolite, let it air dry and press with a steam iron. Works every time.

Thank you for the tip !


Best,

Robert

[The Guy in the Kilt at UC]

I wash my wool hose all the time in the washer, on the cold cycle. Just skip the dryer. Its the heat that does it. I've tried washing hose in the sink and wringing it out, but the washer just does a much better wringing than I do by hand.

By the way, if you're curious what the dryer does to wool hose... I did it once and turned my size 11 hose into size 9... and the other was size 10. (???)

[Ancienne Alliance]

I wash my wool hose all the time in the washer, on the cold cycle. Just skip the dryer. Its the heat that does it. I've tried washing hose in the sink and wringing it out, but the washer just does a much better wringing than I do by hand.

By the way, if you're curious what the dryer does to wool hose... I did it once and turned my size 11 hose into size 9... and the other was size 10. (???)

Soaking hose is one thing, but I get nervous just at the thought of soaking a whole kilt in water, cold or not .


Best,

Robert

[Stravaiger]

Soaking hose is one thing, but I get nervous just at the thought of soaking a whole kilt in water, cold or not .


Best,

Robert

The climate on the West Coast of Scotland tends to be on the damp side & my kilts do get fairly extensive wear on the hill, with the result that they're not infrequently wet to the point of dripping. No shrinkage to date

Machine washing is fine - just so long as you have a cold "Wool" setting. And use a wool specific soap/detergent. It's heat that hurts wool, not water!

[thescot]

We've been over the argument about washing kilts before, and many disagree with me, so there is my disclaimer.

But . . .and it's a big but! I would never dry clean a kilt, no matter what anyone else may say. I do believe that doing so would remove the essential oils that make wool what it is. I don't want that stuff on my kilt. (You will now get lots of reports on successfu dry cleaning, but I did warn you about that.)

You can wash your kilt, but don't do it in a washer. Do it in the tub with mild soap and then hang it up and hose it down. (I use the term hose loosely. the shower head will do a good job. The point is that you wat to get the soap out very gently.) Here's a typical sight that give some instructions.
http://www.your-kilt.com/Kilt-Care.html or
http://www.sonsanddaughtersofscotlan...m#wear%20under or this cool site with photos to demonstrate:
http://www.uncommongatherings.com/RB&Lkilt.htm

Knowing that this works and that dry cleaning is somewhat risky, why not just wash the rascal and rest assured that it'll be OK. As stated above, the real threat is heat, not water.

And, yes, many of us are old enough to remember sweaters and skirts, etc. that come out much smaller than they went in, but some of that is heat and some is the loose weave that tightened up in the wash.

Keep us posted.

P.S. They didn't choose wool in Scotland because it shrinks when wet! Hat's off to Stravaeger for his comment.

[ScottEPooh]

Sadly, I don't own a wool kilt yet, but my wife does a fair bit of knitting and some felting, and she has found the "heat+loose weave=shrinkage" to be very accurate when it comes to wool. Like others have said, sheep get wet all the time and, except for the smell, seem to suffer from no ill effects. My $.02.

[Ancienne Alliance]

We've been over the argument about washing kilts before, and many disagree with me, so there is my disclaimer.

But . . .and it's a big but! I would never dry clean a kilt, no matter what anyone else may say. I do believe that doing so would remove the essential oils that make wool what it is. I don't want that stuff on my kilt. (You will now get lots of reports on successfu dry cleaning, but I did warn you about that.)

You can wash your kilt, but don't do it in a washer. Do it in the tub with mild soap and then hang it up and hose it down. (I use the term hose loosely. the shower head will do a good job. The point is that you wat to get the soap out very gently.) Here's a typical sight that give some instructions.
http://www.your-kilt.com/Kilt-Care.html or
http://www.sonsanddaughtersofscotlan...m#wear%20under or this cool site with photos to demonstrate:
http://www.uncommongatherings.com/RB&Lkilt.htm
.

Thanks for the links and infos.


Best,

Robert

[CDNSushi]

Hmmm..... Well, I think I found the answer Pleater was looking for on a biochem website. Here is the original text, followed by a link to the site (which has the original hyperlinks too)...

In a nutshell, it seems that the "sheep don't shrink" argument is faulty and there IS such a thing as specially treated wool to make it shrink-proof...

Read on...

Re: Why doesn't sheep's wool shrink?
Date: Tue Oct 3 14:56:27 2000
Posted By: Jim Caryl, Grad student, PhD Plasmid Molecular Biology, University of Leeds
Area of science: Biochemistry
ID: 970180902.Bc Message:

Hi there Rebekah,

Well I had no real idea myself, so I turned to a real expert in wool science. This is a very popular and important industry in Australia and New Zealand, where a number of good univeristies run degrees in wool science and production...so to there I turned.

Here is the response I recieved from Miss Helen Daily, who is a professional woolclasser and more than qualified to make this response. You can find more information via the Woolwise website:

"The problem lies in the professor's misinformed question. Wool does not shrink, it felts. And this is simply because of the raised scales of the cuticle layer of the fibre catching on one another. The fibres in a fleece on a sheep are all growing out of the follicles in the same direction, and generally speaking, they all grow at a similar rate. This means that the cuticle scales (which are a bit like the teeth on a saw, but not that pronounced) are all pointed in the same direction. They don't catch on one another. These scales can be seen clearly in electron micrographs. (some available on the Woolwise site).

After the fleece is shorn, the processing stages cause the natural fibre alignment to be completely disrupted. As the fleece is scoured, the "staple" structure is destroyed and the fibres no longer line up "tip to base" as they would in the fleece. They can be in all dimensions and also suffer entangling after scouring and drying, and the purpose of subsequent carding and combing is to remove extraneous matter and disentangle and align the fibres into a parallel arrangement. However the fibres will not necessarily be "tip to base". The scales now can be at 180degrees to one another, and can catch on one another.

When the fibres are spun, they come in close contact with each other, and the interlocking nature of the scales is what helps keep the yarn together (apart from the twist that is inserted). Felting usually occurs in the presence of heat, water and agitation, and this acts as a ratchet, tightening the contact between the fibres in the yarn, and then the yarns in the fabric.

Wool's propensity to felt is because of the scales on the fibre. Other animal fibres have cuticular scales also, but to different degrees. For instance, the scales on human hair are much flatter. I don't know much about dreadlocks, but I imagine this is caused by interrupting the usual parallel arrangement of the hair scales. Fine diameter wools are more likely to felt than broad diameter wools because they have a greater surface area, and hence more scales proportionately.

Shrink-proofing is a chemical treatment of wool, which uses chlorine to "burn" off the scales...this doesn't entirely remove them, but it does lessen their profile, and then the fibres are coated with a resin to smooth the fibre still further. This allows the wool to be machine washed without felting, and the shrinkage of the fabric associated with felting. So that is the story of wool felting in a nutshell. The wool proteins are very interesting, but really don't play a role in this part of the wool story!"

Thanks for that Helen!....and I hope that answers your question Rebekah. I certainly learnt something new!

All the best

Jim Caryl
MAD Scientist

References:

Helen Daily at the University of Adelaide & The Woolwise Website.

Reference:
http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives...1460.Bc.r.html

P.S. I just read somewhere that hair conditioner can de-shrink wool... Coooooool! Anyone ever try that?