Make Fluffy Wool Clouds!

Essentials of Scouring Wool

 1 ~ Skirting ~ hopefully this is done by the person you are buying it from… but if not or if you have your own wooly babies… skirting is taking all the bad, super dirty, full of VM, poopy, parts of wool off the fleece - anything you don’t want to process hopefully gets pulled off here.  You don’t want wool from the belly, head, legs, rump, and sometimes right down the back line. It helps if you can throw it out on a skirting table, or an open table with chicken wire on it.  The skirtings or “bad” parts are EXCELLENT in the garden!  You can either plant them in the bed with your plants or in a hanging basket or use them as a mulch… wool retains 20-30% its weight in water and will release it when the dirt around it dries, it also contains 9-14% nitrogen = good fertilizer, and if you have slugs in your area, it will deter them as a mulch.

2 ~ Tumbling ~ if it has much VM (vegetable matter) you will want to find a way to tumble your wool.  My son and dad made a tumbler out of a cement mixer that wasn’t being used. This is a great way to knock out VM.  You can make a simple hand turned one with a PVC pipe, some wood ends and chicken wire.

3 - Determine your water types - if you have hard water or soft water - one way to test your water is to put a small bit of soap in a jar, fill with water about half way, put on a lid and shake it.  If you end up with murky water then you have hard water, if your water is more clear with bubbly suds on top then you have soft water.  If your water is hard you are going to need to figure out a way to soften it or use different water, as hard water won't clean wool well.  Test your water PH - mine is neutral 6-7, if it’s too acidic or too basic you’ll have troubles washing it too

4 - Scouring Prep -  I like to weigh out wool into 1 lb bunches, I put a 1 lb bunch into a large laundry bag with larger holes (be careful not to get ones with small almost non-existent holes or the dirt can’t escape).  Optional - Pre-soak in cold water.  If the fleece is really dirty I like to pre-soak the wool in cold water for a while (a couple hours or days… really doesn’t matter as long as you don’t agitate it a bunch).  This allows your soap to work on just the lanolin and not the layers of dirt when you scour. 

5 ~ Now Your Ready to scour the wool! I turn up my water heater to 140-150 (don’t leave it up, this temp can BURN you or your loved ones, remember to turn it down when you are done!)  Rambouillet Lanolin melts at 120 and begins to solidify at ~118.  Get your scouring bucket, pot, plastic tub, or washing machine (I started using plastic tubs… then bought old mechanical washing machines and removed the agitators.) You can use your machine if it doesn’t have the auto sensing devises and if it lets you fill the machine with water and then turn it off without it draining… you DO NOT want it to pour water onto your wool, or agitate it!

1st ~ Fill your container with about 3x as much HOT water as you have wool. 

2nd ~ Add your soap, I use and sell Unicorn Power Scour, follow the directions on the amount of soap vs wool, it does a good job and is meant for wool and fibers.  It is best to use a soap that is meant for raw wool because it is pH neutral. 

3rd ~ Add your wool, gently push it down into the water, do not stir or agitate it, too much movement in hot water can felt it. Let it soak for 20 mins or until the temp is falling to 119 .  Do not add more water while the wool is in the water. 

4th ~ Once time is up or temp is getting down to 120 - Prep your next hot bath. If you pre-soaked your wool you will not need to do as many washes, I typically do 1-2 washes with soap and 2-3 rinses in clean hot water to get the soap out.  Each soak bath should be around 20 mins

Tips : I prefer to use an immersion heater to keep the water temp above 120 during the whole wash.  If you don’t have one, you can try a couple things to keep the temp above 115, because if it falls below that temp in the first couple washes then the lanolin can re-adhere to the wool and almost nothing will take it off a 2nd time.  I have also used a hot plate and scoured wool in a big pot using the hot plate on low to keep it at temp.  Or just babysit the wool, as soon as the temp falls below 119 you’ll want to have your next hot bath ready for the wool to go into, squeeze the water out of the wool and put it directly into the next hot bath.   Another tool I use is a temp gun to easily check water temps, but you can use any kind of thermometer.

If you over wash or overheat the wool it will become brittle or felted, the tips will not always look super clean, they can be “sunburned” a light yellowed color, but once you card and spin you won’t see it.  The main goal or scouring is to get out the dirt and most of the lanolin.

5th ~ Squeeze out as much water as you can and move the wool to the next hot soak bath.   Try not to let the wool cool in-between soaks, I like to go straight from one hot bath, spin or squeeze out the water and straight into the next hot bath. 

6th ~ Once you are done scouring, squeeze or spin out as much water as possible.  If using a washing machine for the soaks, I squeeze out what water I can, pull the wool out of the machine, drain the water, put the bagged wool back in and do a spin cycle for a min, take the wool out. 

7th ~ Fluff & lay out the wool to dry or you can put it straight into your mordant solution to prep for dyeing.  If you are cleaning small amounts of wool, your skirting table can double as a drying table. For large amounts of wool, you can make a dry rack with pvc pipe, plastic chicken fabric, and zip-ties.


Essentials of Scouring Wool

  • Skirt out the dung and bad spots

    Step 1 ~ Skirt (pull) out the dirty, dung, short, belly wool.

  • Tumble out the bits and pieces

    Step 2 ~ Tumble out all the bits and pieces of hay, dust, and dirt…

  • Wash it

    Step 3 ~ Carefully soak the wool in warm water and special soap to clean the dirt and lanolin out

  • Let it Dry

    Step 4 ~ Squeeze out the water and lay out to dry