Hey all, I have quite a bit of unraveled yarn that is just a little too fine to be comfortable to knit with. I've been holding it double for a while now but I was wondering if it would be worth the effort to ply it for some added strength/consistency.

I'm trying to get some yarn balls with just mohair.

Could anyone help me understand please?

If a sweater is made out of 50% mohair and 50% other materials does that usually mean when I unravel it it'll be 2 strands of yarn? Or does the mohair piece blend with the other one into a single strand?

Or would I have better luck looking for a 100% mohair sweater to unravel?

Unraveled a cotton/acrylic aran weight pullover from a yard sale in August and finished my Sevilla Blouse by Petite Knit this evening. Less than 1 yard of yarn left. Woohoo!

Latest unraveling project, a cotton/acrylic Lands End sweater from Goodwill. Will eventually be knitted into the Provence top by Ekaterina Vorobeva on Ravelry. Little hands are helping today!

I have been unraveling straight into cakes. How important is it to unravel into hanks? Is it because hanks can be washed before you re-knit the yarn?

The sweaters I have unraveled in the past have been sweaters that were knit for me and my mother by my grandmother that I had decided to repurpose into more modern looking styles. I would then wash and block the new items.

Is it better to wash the yarn before knitting?

I have been low key scouting the sweaters at my local thrift stores in case I came across one worthy of being a "yarn donor". I finally hit gold and it's such a find I'm actually torn about whether or not to unravel it. I found an Irish wool, hand knit in the round Irish sweater. It's beautiful and only has one hole in the cabling on the shoulder. I can mend the the hole and wear it or unravel it (and I would incorporate the original tag as well). Have any of you had second thoughts about unraveling your finds?

I have a butt load of acrylic yarn and I think some bamboo and very little cotton. I want to crochet clothes like a cardigan or hats before winter but I don't want it to stretch out weird or shrink in the wash. some of my yarn is unlabeled since I thrift yarn or I get it as gifts from friends who don't want to throw it away, so I don't know what I have but I currently can't afford more yarn. I'm semi-confident in my ability to tell the difference between types of yarn based off its texture, if it's a plastic-based yarn or not.

what yarn is recommended for clothes? what yarn is better for blankets?

if acrylic yarn is ok for a sweater, is it okay for a bikini or bralette? would it retain its shape even if it's stretched over my head or get wet?

some things make sense to me, like only use cotton for things like underwear, dish rags, or pot holders due to bacteria or heat damage. but I don't really know how well yarn or my projects will react to wear and tear or becoming wet. also, whats best for amigurumi?

When you thrift something to unravel do you wash then unravel or unravel->create->wash? Just wondering how everyone else does it. I'm new at this. Many thanks!

I spent hours spit splicing what seemed like good quality cashmere. Dense bouncy stitches, no pilling, great seams etc.

After skeining and washing to get the kinks out every single join fell apart. I checked the care label and it was machine washable at 40*C, which is the standard mixed fibre temperature in UK. It didn’t even say to use the wool programme, you could just chuck it in with similar colours.

“No pilling” is no longer a definitive sign of good quality yarn, unless the care label says “hand wash“ or “dry clean”.

As I’ve just got an electric spinning wheel I might use it for practice and make it up into ribbed hats to hide the lumps from the knots.

Would welcome some advice on whether it will behave in the same way as the good stuff. I was planning to ply it with a very similar colour but high quality yarn to get a sweater quantity of pastel pink fingering weight. And I have the perfect design for it in my head. I guess swatching and washing is the answer, but any words of experience would be really welcome.

Hi all so as the title says, I've been going to thrift stores and buying cheap sweaters to frog for yarn for a few years now, however, I've always run into the same problem of the yarn separating once I frog it. So a once twisted together, probably cotton, yarn, just separates into four or five strands and is difficult to work with. Does anyone else run into this problem, and if so do you have any solutions?

It doesn't matter if I go from the piece to the yarn winder immediately, it always just un-twists as soon as it's not in a stitch.

I bought a lambswool jumper in the summer and started unpicking the seams. Yesterday I unraveled some of one sleeve. There was some spot splicing involved but that’s fine.

I’ve unraveled a few wool sweaters into skeins but the yarn is kinked. I read that I should work it into hanks and dunk in water/wool wash then hang to get the kinks out…or steam. Steaming isn’t as efficient as dunking in wool wash.

Both processes take a chunk of time. How necessary is it? Will my FOs turn out wonky if I use the kinked yarn?

My 100% cotton aren’t near as kinked (makes sense given the fibers memory).

Is the time invested worth the payout?

I began unraveling several sweaters, but due to a repetitive stress injury and upcoming move, am unable to reclaim the yarn myself as planned. Does anyone have suggestions of where to post these materials for someone else to reclaim and use? I'm in the Chicago area.

I’m using the yarn from a fine cashmere sweater, knitting it triple ply straight off the knitted pieces.

Does anyone have a rough and ready way to estimate how much fabric I can produce?

Is this a reasonable approach: if I use the right needles to produce a stockinette fabric at an appropriate gauge for the tripled yarn then I’m producing a fabric 3x the thickness of the original so I will get 1/3 of the original surface area. Then discount for moth holes and felted underarms and weird cuff stitches, so assume 1/4 of the original surface area from the usable yarn.

In your experience is this a reasonable assumption?

I have 3 large men’s grey sweaters and am considering marling the 3 yarns, working top down and hoping to get at least a cropped sweater in a 34” bust for me.

Hello all, I have been lurking here and watching all the wonderful materials you salvage from your quests. I want to start my first unravel but I am unsure how or where to start? There are a few moth holes in the sweater do I start there or do I go to the seam? Any helpful tips and tricks would be much appreciated ☺️ thank you

Title. I'm currently looking at an mens' XL long-sleeve polo from Loro Piana made from knitted vicuña that somebody's trying to get rid of, because it's got two somewhat large moth-holes on the chest.

On the whole though, there's many many inches of precious fabric that could probably be upcycled. Does anybody have experience working with this particular fabric/anything as delicate as this? Is there any merit in the idea of unravelling and re-using it, or even cutting out sections of it to re-sew into an infinity scarf, a beanie, or something of the sort?

Picture of the shirt.

A year ago I made my first (mostly) wool scarf out of the prettiest red yarn, and immediately tossed it in the dryer (big mistake, I've learned my lesson). I haven't worn it since :(. I still really want a nice red scarf for the winter and was wondering if I could just unravel the shrunken scarf and reuse the yarn or if there's some structural integrity that I messed up and if I would be better off just getting new yarn. Like, will it be less fluffy or will that be fixed by reworking it? Thanks!

I've recently gotten minorly obsessed with unraveling and repurposing the yarn. One thing I've noticed however is that some of the yarns come unwound (for lack of a better word) and the individual strands start to separate. Is it possible to re-spin them to get the strands to stay together better? I sadly don't have the funds for a spinning wheel but would something like a drop spindle or this type of machine (https://a.co/d/cDTSBBl) work?

Picked up this for $3 yesterday and had every intention of taking it apart last night. It's a lovely bulky lambswool and, other than working with two strands, it looked like fun. But I was surprised to find a label inside that read Sport Obermeyer and I got that little electrical zip I feel when I suspect I found a treasure. Not being a fashionista, I'd never hear heard of the brand but apparently it's nice. (I mean, $300 sweater nice, not Prada nice.) There's one just like it for $85 on Poshmark!!! It's not a current style on their site but this sort of Care Bears/early 80s look is their thing. 🤷‍♀️

So now I'm torn. I have a huge stash, much of it from reclaimed sweaters, and I have no specific plans for this yarn. I won't wear it so either I go to the trouble of listing it in hopes it'll eventually sell for $85. Or frog that puppy! What would you do?