Processing Price List for 2025

The Process

We offer the washing and processing of your fleeces into either batts or roving. Please make sure to skirt your fleeces thoroughly by removing matts, burrs, and vegetation: you will save yourself money in the long run. If you aren't sure how to skirt a fleece, there are several excellent videos on YouTube that demonstrate the process.

Weighing

All fleeces will be weighed upon arrival at the mill. This is the "unwashed" weight. Washing prices are based on the unwashed weight. 

Washing

Washing removes lanolin, dirt and sweat from the fleece, but it won't remove matts or much of the vegetative matter. This is why skirting is so important. A heavily soiled fleece may need a second wash, adding to the cost. The fibre is dried and weighed again. This is the "washed" weight.

Picking

Once dried, the picker opens up the fleece in preparation for carding. Picking removes some of the debris. The picker cannot open matted fibres, only break them, which will add undesirable and unremovable little lumps, or "nepps," to your finished product. Remove matts ahead of time during skirting.

Carding

Carding roughly aligns the fibres in the same direction and removes more debris. Coarser fibre is faster to card than finer fibre. The carder can produce either a batt or roving. Either can be used for spinning or wet felting, though spinners generally prefer roving and felters generally prefer batts. Batts can also be used as quilting material in duvets. Fleeces with large amounts of vegetative matter may need to be carded twice, adding to the expense. Remember: skirt, skirt, skirt!

Very fine fleeces, such as merino or cria fleeces, are not picked but instead carded twice. The picker can break the fibres of very fine fleeces and create short fibres, or "noils." Noils don't spin smoothly and tend to create a tweedy texture to the yarn. Double carding takes more time than picking and carding, so the finest fleeces are more expensive to process. 

Price List

1. Basic processing: $25.00/lb., incoming weight

• Includes a soapy soak, 3 washes and a rinse, picking, and carding.
• Fibre can be processed to open cloud, batts, or roving.

2. Double-carding: additional $5.00/lb., incoming weight

• Required by fine fibres that would be shredded if run through the picker.
• Required to remove excessive vegetative matter (VM) in a fleece.
• It takes about quadruple the time to run fibre through the carder vs. through the picker.

3. Blending: additional $3.50/lb., incoming weight

• The carder intake is divided into several sections: we weigh out the same amount of wool (usually about 80g) for each section as it heads into the carder.
• To insure an even blend, each section must contain the same proportion of each fibre in the blend; i.e., for a 50/50 wool/alpaca blend, each section must have 40g of wool and 40g of alpaca evenly spread over each intake section: this significantly increases the time required to card the fibre.

4. Skirting: $50/hour, minimum 1 hour

• We’d prefer you do your own skirting, but we can do it for you, if necessary.
  

5. Other information

• Prices do not include shipping or taxes.
• Invoices must be paid in full before the fibre leaves the mill.
  
• Finished product that is not paid for or picked up within 30 days without arrangement becomes the property of Farfelu Fibreworks.