After cleaning and lubricating everything, and being confused for a while, I have successfully made some fabric. No idea what next, but I’m now sure this second hand machine actually works.
An intarsia carriage has unlocked INFINITE POSSIBILITIES!! What do you mean I can just put whatever I want on my clothes?
Machine is a SK360 standard gauge with ribber and intarsia carriage. Yarn is Knitpicks Comfy Fingering (cotton acrylic blend). The chart is adapted from a combination of knitting and cross stitch charts I found online.
I put together a spreadsheet that writes basic sweater patterns for the knitting machine from your own swatch and measurements. Old patterns never matched my yarn, and redoing the maths for every size by hand got tedious.
You type your gauge, your bed (fine, standard, mid, bulky or any needle count) and your measurements. It only lists the rows where you do something, each with the carriage side and the needles in work, like this line from the back:
RC 220 · COR · Set carriage to hold. Push 12 Ns at left to HP. · 174 sts · L75 to R87
If you already use the KnitFactoryImpl generator, it's free and has more styles than this, so you may not need it. The difference is mostly the format: every shaping row has its own line with needle numbers, the front neck comes as two tables (right side, then left side), and a schematic tab shows each finished measurement next to the one you asked for. It's a plain .xlsx with no macros, and the formulas are all visible.
You can use the drop shoulder version without paying, it's here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1FClDJmdO2Gb8IG1QCcdgZ6h13Qo8v0PF?usp=sharing
The full version adds the raglan and a short PDF guide: https://thegraphitelab.etsy.com/listing/4586880285/machine-knitting-sweater-calculator
A script tested it on thousands of random sizes and gauges, but nobody has knitted one from it yet. If you try it I'd really like to hear how it comes out.
Hey folks, thought I'd quickly share my first ever attempt at machine knitting as it turned out way better than I'd hoped 😁
Second picture is my pile of shame, all the times I've messed up and I'm not skilled enough to recover (yet) so had to restart 😭😂
I've been a crocheter for a while now, I'd like to think I've gotten pretty good at it but have never been able to get the hang of hand knitting and I'm currently recovering from an arm injury which means I'm probably not going to be able to pick it up until at least the new year, but I was really missing my crafting so thought I'd give machine knitting a go and I'm glad I did.
If anyone is interested the pattern is based on a YouTuber "KnitFactoryImpl"s video "The Morgan Donner Medieval Hat" and the yarn is Carron Simply Soft color gold.