CopCar and I have been disussing, in the comments to Musings here, the difference in yarn weights between the US and the UK. It has become clear that misunderstandings have come up so I have found here a list of various yarn weights for the UK and the US (I've taken out the Australian/NZ comparisons as not germain to the subject and have had to adapt the chart as Blogger won't allow me to show it as two columns side by side). Hoping now we can both speak from the same page, so to speak ~grin~:-
Yarn thickness or weight conversion chart UK/USA
UK = USA
2 ply = light fingering
3 ply = fingering
4 ply = fingering / sport
double knitting =sport / knitting worsted
= knitting worsted
Aran =
chunky = bulky
I have to admit that on those occasons that I am following a US pattern usually, when I was following crochet patterns I would use our Aran yarn to match US's worsted and it seemed a near enough match in terms of tensions, etc.
Yarn thickness or weight conversion chart UK/USA
UK = USA
2 ply = light fingering
3 ply = fingering
4 ply = fingering / sport
double knitting =sport / knitting worsted
= knitting worsted
Aran =
chunky = bulky
I have to admit that on those occasons that I am following a US pattern usually, when I was following crochet patterns I would use our Aran yarn to match US's worsted and it seemed a near enough match in terms of tensions, etc.
6 comments:
Hmmm...interesting. Thanks for the information, Val. It is interesting to browse through a store that carries a wide variety of yarns. I'll put a copy of this someplace that will let me use two columns. ; )
Cop Car
Culture clash.....it pops up in the oddest places. Here, you're talking about yarn. I was blogging about "pigs in the blanket" and I know that we have a number of food areas where our language differs.
This is a handy chart, Val. Thanks for the leg work.
Buffy
Val--Come out, come out, wherever you are. I miss you! I do hope that your absence means that you are enjoying yourself rather than there being a more sinister explanation. CC
I've been a member of Yahoo Groups for knitting and for crochet for some time now and every so often the subject of different terminology of yarns has risen so often. Over here the term 4 ply applies to a type of yarn of a specific weight and so the fact that it implies four different strans twisted together is immaterial. In fact the 4 ply I am knitting with has only 3 strands, not 4.
Pigs in blankets - isn't that sausages in pastry?
Val--I do slip up, at times, and mentally think of a yarn as being formed from the given-number of plies; but, I do know that it is the weight of the yarn that is at issue. It suddenly occurs to me, however, that I don't know whether the "weight" is an actual weight (so many ounces for a standard length) or a gage (diameter of the total yarn). Does it really mean an actual weight?
CC
Second time of posting - the Internet swallowed my first attempt.
I used the wrong term when I wrote before when I said that 4 ply was a yarn of specific weight. I should have said of specific thickness, or as you said gage. I'm sorry this may have confused you.
Over here we chose yarn of whatever thickness we want and then buy it by weight - i.e. so many balls of that yarn, each of which weighs 25, 50 or 100 grams. I am aware that in America you tend to buy by length - I have seen e-mails from knitters saying that they need XXX yards to make a jersey. The ball band of the yarn I am using at the moment says "100 g, and in much smaller print 494 yds, 452 m" (presumably because Sirdar hopes to sell also to the American market). However we British always buy so many hundred grams balls of yarn to make a garment.
Hope this makes better sense.
Post a Comment