Sport Weight Yarn - Australian equivalent?

General Knitting
1

I have a pattern for an heirloom baby blanket knitted in a shell pattern. The yarn is called “sport weight” Needle sizes are 5 & 6. This is an American pattern & I’m not sure if needle sizes are the same in Australia. Have been told that sport weight is equivlent to our Double knitting. I’m going to have a crack at it using 3 ply & size 3 needles. Its only a blanket, so the guage isn’t crucial, but I would be interested if anyone can shed some light on the terminology.

2

It’s an American weight between DK and 4-ply. American sizes 5 and 6 are 3.45mm and 4mm which are old UK 9 and 8, but I don’t know which way they number the needles in Australia, sorry.

3

It’s a little thinner than DK yarn, about a 6 ply.

4

Thanks - our sizes are the same as UK

5

Elizabeth’s Fiber & Yarn Store has a nice chart that help compare various yarn weights.

Personally I prefer the WPI (Wraps Per Inch) rather than a name to designate yarn size. If you were told in the pattern that it used yarn at 14 WPI, you could pull out your WPI tool and check to see if the yarn you like gives you 14 WPI regardless what name the manufacture gives it. My WPI tool is a small flash light that I always carry. It used a nail file to mark a line at 0, 1 inch and 2 inches. I pull out my WPI tool and wrap loosly for 2 inches, count the wraps and divide by 2.

If two different yarns give similar WPI they should knit up at a similar gauge.

6

There’s some discrepancies in the wpi given in the charts and in the descriptions below though. In the text she lumps baby, fingering and sock yarn into one category and calls it 14 wpi, while in the chart that’s under sport. She has sport at 12 wpi which is under worsted in the chart, and worsted is at 9 wpi which is listed as bulky on the chart. So I’m not sure how accurate it is.

7

True, but if I have yarn that is 13 WPI and I want to duplicate the pattern I can take my WPI tool and find yarn at 13 WPI and get similar results. This is not always true if I use sports/Worsted/Bulky or even the numbers in the little skeine Icon.

I have seen a better chart but can not find it this morning, too many book marks, too little time.

8

There’s one at the bottom of this page - http://yarnforward.com/tension.html