Plying Help: 4 Ways to Splice Your Singles

The Problem: Let’s say you are spinning for a large project, you’ve spun five or six bobbins of singles, and you are set to ply a three-ply yarn. As you ply along, happily watching your lovely yarn pile up on the bobbin, one of the three bobbins runs out of singles. Do you have to break the other bobbins and stop—nope! You need to splice your yarn.

Splice means to unite or combine. In spinner’s speak, it’s how we often describe adding in a new single during plying.

New spinners often have questions about this important part of successful plying, while experienced spinners often have one go-to method. However, a wool spinner might find themselves stumped when splicing cotton or linen. And some joins work better for knitting than weaving, for example. Here are four common methods and tips for putting them to use.

1. Basic Splice

This is the first splicing method I learned, and it is what I most commonly see modern spinners using as I travel around the country.