Textile Manufacturing By Pre-industrial Methods - Yarn Formation - Flax

Flax

The preparations for spinning is similar across most plant fibers, including Flax and Hemp. Flax is the fiber used to create linen. Cotton is handled differently since it uses the fruit of the plant and not the stem.

Harvesting

Flax is pulled out of the ground about a month after the initial blooming when the lower part of the plant begins to turn yellow, and when the most forward of the seeds are found in a soft state. It is pulled in handfuls and several handfuls are tied together with slip knot into a 'beet'. The string is tightened as the stalks dry. The seed heads are removed and the seeds collected, by threshing and winnowing.

Retting

Retting is the process of rotting away the inner stalk, leaving the outer fibres intact. A standing pool of warm water is needed, into which the beets are submerged. An acid is produced when retting, and it would corrode a metal container.

At 80 °F (27 °C), the retting process takes 4 or 5 days, it takes longer when colder. When the retting is complete the bundles feel soft and slimy, The process can be overdone, and the fibres rot too.

Dressing the flax

Dressing is removing the fibres from the straw and cleaning it enough to be spun. The flax is broken, scutched and hackled in this step.

Breaking The process of breaking breaks up the straw into short segments. The beets are untied and fed between the beater of the breaking machine, the set of wooden blades that mesh together when the upper jaw is lowered.

Scutching In order to remove some of the straw from the fiber a wooden scutching knife is scaped down the fibers while they hang vertically.

Heckling Fibre is pulled through various sized heckling combs. A Heckling comb is a bed of sharp, long-tapered, tempered, polished steel pins driven into wooden blocks at regular spacing. A good progression is from 4 pins per square inch, to 12, to 25 to 48 to 80. The first three will remove the straw, and the last two will split and polish the fibers. Some of the finer stuff that comes off in the last heckles can be carded like wool and spun. It will produce a coarser yarn than the fibres pulled through the heckles because it will still contain some straw.

Spinning

Flax can either be spun from a distaff, or from the spinner's lap. Spinners keep their fingers wet when spinning, to prevent forming fuzzy thread. Usually singles are spun with an "S" twist. After flax is spun it is washed in a pot of boiling water for a couple of hours to set the twist and reduce fuzziness.

Many handspinners, will buy a roving of flax. This roving is spun in the same manner as above. The rovings may come with very long fibers (4 to 8 inches), or much shorter fibers (2 to 3 inches).