Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Yarn ball wider revisited - specifications-part 1

I have received requests to post specifications and some steps in making the Yarn Ball Winder ( see the first post about it here)

Now for those who will want to build a similar one here below is a picture with the dimensions of the one I have build .Measurements are in centimeters but I figured you can use the calculator to transform to imperial .


Since the photo is rather small, I took others to exemplify the other measurements. For example the photo below is a view from the side of the yarn ball winder so you can see better how everything is attached.

Let's start with the number of threads, washers and nuts that I have used.
First of all I must mention that since I had no idea of the width of the materials I had to pass though , I couldn't buy a threaded screw ( since they come in different lengths)so I opted to buy a threaded rod of 8 mm in diameter that I cut to size according to my needs.

For the big wheel I used 4 washers,3 type M8 locking nuts and the threaded rod is cut to 7 cm length ( M8 refers to the fact that they are used for an 8mm thread)

For the small "wheel" ( it's actually 2 wheels glued together) I used 5 washers ,4 type M8 locking nuts and the threaded rod is cut to 13 cm length.

For the spindle wheel I used 3 washers , 2 type M8 locking nuts and a threaded screw like in the picture below ( still 8 mm diameter).

I also used an L bracket 2 cm wide and 10 cm sides, 2 small wooden wheels of 4.5 cm in diameter and 1.5 cm thickness, 1 rubber door stop 2.5cm height that is a truncated cone shape as you can see from the photo below, the base is larger( 3.1 cm diameter) than the top part that is in contact with the spindle wheel ( 2.9 cm diameter)and 1 meter of rubber coated laundry rope ( if you can find a round rubber gasket of the size you need it will be better not to have the knot visible)


The pine board that I used to cut the large wheel and the spindle wheels are 1.8 cm thick and the base board on which everything is mounted is 2 cm thick.

Before you start anything you got to understand how this winder works. First the larger it is the big wheel, the ratio is increased meaning you have to turn it less and the spindle turn faster ( less movement from your part). The winder works like this : the large wheel and smaller wheels glued up they move together , being connected by the belt ( laundry rope) , while the door stop on top of the glued up small wheels has a a fixed position( he is jammed on the threaded rod between 2 lock nuts and washers ( please see pictures) so he will never move.

The L bracket is screwed on the the small wheels making it a part of the moving mechanism. The spindle wheel is free to rotate on the bracket ( the lock nuts are not very tight in order to allow it to rotate). As you can see from the image, the spindle wheel is in contact with the door nob that has a stationary position.

Because you spin the big wheel, which causes the smaller wheels with the bracket to spin faster , the spindle wheel being in contact with a fixed element, is forced to rotate around his own center ( the point to which is attached to the bracket).
On the next post I will describe some steps in creating your own and some suggestions for substituting elements.

If you think you didn't understand the working mechanism behind the winder, please let me know and I shall try to make a video to demonstrate what I have written above.

11 comments:

  1. having a hard time getting the angle right, i have wonky ball

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    1. Hi Donna, Sorry for the late reply. I might help if i could see a photo of your device.
      For my winder, the angle of the former L bracket came up to 120 degrees after I had tried to wind a ball and it worked badly because the angle wasn't right. At first the angle was smaller so the spindle wheel put too much pressure on the rubber door stop and I couldn't turn it easy so I began pulling it apart little by little with my bare hands in order to ease the pressure. The spindle circle has to be in contact with the rubber door stop just right to make it rotate.
      I will post a short video to exemplify the rotation of parts in order to understand better the movement that makes the yarn balls.

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  2. Hi Laura, I got it together and it works quite well. Let me know what you think. http://i896.photobucket.com/albums/ac170/dlwyman/Yarn/DSCN1087.jpg

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  3. May I say yours it's much better than mine . I bet it even runs smoother. Congratulations. I truly envy your winder . It really is pretty too .It's great that you could find hobby materials. In Romania I could barely find a wooden wheel.I guess it's time that I tune up mine as well. Enjoy using it and congrats once more.
    PS: Please let me know if I have your permission to post your picture on my Featured page. Thank you.

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  4. Thank you Laura for your help and the inspiration. By all means you may post the picture of my winder. I think the trick was using urethane belting for the belt. I never realized that you were in Romania. You're a very talented young lady.

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  5. Thank you for posting dimensions and your descriptions.

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  6. Hola. Quisiera saber donde o como conseguir las dos ruedas pequeñas que van unidas.
    Gracias!

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  7. Hola. Quisiera saber donde o como conseguir las dos ruedas pequeñas que van unidas.
    Gracias!

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  8. Hi i am not very good at looking at pictures and doing this sort of thing. LOL. Is there any way you could do a video on how to make this? Oh how i would appriciate this. Thanks ever so much. P.S. I HAVE A HARD HEAD LOL

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  9. Hi i am not very good at looking at pictures and doing this sort of thing. LOL. Is there any way you could do a video on how to make this? Oh how i would appriciate this. Thanks ever so much. P.S. I HAVE A HARD HEAD LOL

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  10. Hi, I am having trouble getting the belt to work correctly. It is either coming off the large wheel or slipping on the small one. Any recommendations?

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