I have an old, small, and inefficient dryer. I was cleaning it out today when I remarked upon the huge quantity of lint built up in the THREE CYCLES :mad: it takes to get a moderate sized load dry. Anyway, I got to wondering, if I saved up all the lint for a long time, could I spin it into yarn and make a sweater out of it?
How about cat fur? I sometimes threaten my cats that I’ll take all the fur they shed and knit a new cat. Could cat fur be spun into yarn?
Does the threat to your cats work? I’d think that they’d want a yarn kitty to play with 
As to your question, I actually have no idea, but it is something I have wondered, too. Although, its always such an ugly greeny-bluey-greyish colour, I don’t think I’d wear the sweater if I did have one!
no, the fibers(except the cat hair) are too short, but you can make a boiled wool felt out of it.
I doubt it since the fiber length is so short. Do a search on making felt (lots of web sites). Try it with your lint.
I’ve spun a pretty sad-quality yarn out of my cat’s fur. The fibers are really too short, and collecting it is too hard. I don’t shear the cat., of course, I just use the hair that I brush out of her fur when she’s shedding. Like, now. The temperature jumps twenty degrees in one week, and that cat drops five pounds of fur. Anyway, Pooty-paws is white with black spots–an equal opportunity shedder, who can besmirch white clothing and dark upholstry with equal easy–but unlike in the Sylvester and Tweety cartoons, the yarn just turns out gray. With one brushing I can make maybe 8 inches of yarn. It’s sturdy enough to knit or crochet with if you work carefully. But I’m not about to collect a bunch in a bag so that I can make more. Ick.
Pooty-paws is a short-hair–I bet if I had some fur from a long-hair I could make some serious yarn.
Lint, on the other hand, is made up of fibers that are much to short.
Oooh, I just did a Google search on “Spin pet hair” and found out I’m not nearly as freaky as I thought . . . or maybe I am, but I have a lot of company.
Yes, you can do it, if you mix the short fibers with longer fibers. So your yarn won’t be 100% lint.
http://knitting.about.com/cs/spininfo/index.htm will take you to the first page of about.com’s list of spinning webpages.
I didn’t see anything on lint specifically, but it should be a good start.
Matt is off his meds again…
You can compost dryer lint, and I’ve heard both that you can leave it out for the birds to make nests out of, and that you can’t leave it out for birds because they inhale the microscopic fibers and die. I compost mine in the summer, and use them to make firestarters in the winter. (Melt down old candle stubs and pour over lint-filled paper egg-cartons, TP tubes, or packratty equivilent.)
If your dryer is THAT inefficient, you might call your power company and see if they have any monetary incentives for you to upgrade to a new dryer (rebates, etc). Here in the states it’s really encouraged, and even if they don’t, you might want to figure out how much it’s costing you to run three loads for every one and see how long a new dryer would pay for itself. It might be worth looking into, depending on how much your power is costing in your area.
It’s still saner than my early childhood plan to make a cushion out of a mixture of glue and pencil shavings.
Yarn from dryer lint? Take some lint in your hand and pull a small bit of it to a point. Moisten your other fingers and try to twist it into a fiber the size of yarn. Now yank on it hard. If it’s strong, then there’s your answer. If not, then you might have done it badly. I think it can be done and would be easy. If spun tightly enough, the length of the fibers will hold. I tried it in my dryer. It worked. All lint might not be the same. Spin at your own risk.
I remember many months ago this came up in my craft Group, (Dogs, though) and several People with Dogs had tried it, and found it varied greatly from breed to breed. (Reaction was also divided on whether this was a bit weird/ creepy, or useful use of material -hair- avalaible anyway when regularly brushing the dog).
As mentioned, combining hair with other good Quality yarn is possible.
I do know that cotton has to go through a process called “carding” to prepare it for spinning. If you had a large enough batch of lint so that you could successfully do that, then I see no reason why you couldn’t move on to spinning it.
Given your extraordinary posting history I think you should petition for a new username. Perhaps “Reanimator876”?
I’ve thought about it, given all the cat and dog hair I pull out of the carpet. Stuff a bag and make a pillow, perhaps.
Here’s a relevant book for the OP. Looks like it’s mostly about how to make little felt finger puppets, but using cat hair.
For information, if you wear said sweater in the rain or snow, you will smell like a wet dog until it fully drys.
if your dryer takes a long time to dry clothes most likely the issue is the vent tube that takes air to the outside is clogged up. There are companies that specialize in cleaning those tubes.
Somehow, I doubt that the dryer is still working 15 years later.
Here’s a company that will take your cat hair, spin it and crochet a lil’ cute heart out of it … FurEverKeepsakes … cheaper than a taxidermist …
