Comments | knitting: diagnosing unwanted holes in knitting

gerimaple in knitting

diagnosing unwanted holes in knitting

Dec 05, 2010 22:58

Is there a way to do Wendy Johnson's double-wrapped short row heel that doesn't result in an ugly mess?

I'm currently working on a pair of socks. My usual go-to pattern is kathrynt's Universal Sock Pattern, but the current socks are varigated yarn (Cascade Fixation #9172), and the darn stuff is insisting on ugly pooling with the flap-and-gusset heel. ( Read more... )

technique - short rows, pattern - socks

Comments 9

tashabear December 6 2010, 07:16:48 UTC

At least on the flap-and-gusset socks, maybe you need a longer heel flap. It looks like you're putting stress at the top of the gusset because you have a greater distance from that point to the bottom of your foot than the pattern calls for.

gerimaple December 6 2010, 09:52:13 UTC

that's certainly a possibility (makes as much or more sense than anything I've come up with on my own), but I have the same problem with the decreases for the wedge toe.

tashabear December 6 2010, 17:30:12 UTC

You might want to try a more gradual decrease, then. Or maybe you're just hard on your socks?

baileh December 6 2010, 13:25:02 UTC

I wish I could help, but I just wanted to say that I've had the same problem with the short row heels. The one sock I did that way has awful holes at the heels and toes. I'm putting off starting the second one until I figure this out.

oddrid December 6 2010, 14:46:51 UTC

I had the same problem! I hope someone can help out with this.

hugh_mannity December 6 2010, 14:58:23 UTC

*looks at socks*

Nope. Not ugly short row heels.

I'm not quite sure what I do with the double wrap. I'd have to have a heel in progress to check. I think it's all in how you pick up the wrap. I do them through the back of the loop for knit, I know. Not so sure about purls.

Depending on the shape of your ankle, you might need a small gusset on the short row heel.

What I do is about an inch before I start the heel, increase at both sides of the top of the foot, 4 times on alternate rows. I'm working at about 10 rows/inch so that gets me nicely to just about the heel. As I'm also working at about 8 st/in -- that gives me an inch of ease. After working the heel, I'll do a couple of rounds on all the stitches, then decrease my 8 stitches over the next 8 rows, 2 at a time on alternate rows. The extra ease at the ankle stops the short row "join" becoming overstretched.

sarakate December 6 2010, 16:30:20 UTC

I think you've got one fundamental problem, and the separate issues are various manifestations thereof -- you're getting stitches twisted up funny in your SSK. I think if we straighten that out, everything will get better. I'm going to explain it all the way down to fundamentals, which may be overkill, but if you go through what you're doing carefully this should allow you to discover where you're deviating from expected procedure and results ( ... )