A.R.A.N. PROJECT

From Ctrywool@aol.com Mon Oct 27 09:59:40 1997
Date: Mon, 27 Oct 1997 09:45:51 -0500 (EST)
From: Ctrywool@aol.com
To: knit@Bolis.com
Subject: KNIT: A.R.A.N. #22 - Yoke Decreasing In-The-Round

Good morning all from the rainy and dreary (GREAT DAY FOR KNITTING !!!) 
Hudson Valley of New York State.

RAGLAN DECREASING IN THE ROUND

Decreasing raglan-style is rather simple. But, for those of you a bit math
challenged, you can skip to the end and see what numbers I used and save
yourself this agony . 

When you work the decrease I explained in post #20...

* P 2 tog, TK (twisted knit), P 2 tog*

at each of the four raglan points (which will become raglan lines because
of the twisted knit stitch), you will lose 8 sts for every completed
round. 

We will use this comfortable fact as we plot the final neck number of
stitches. 

Percentage sweaters have come a long way since Elizabeth Zimmerman's day. 
Styles have changed. Back when she was plotting her sweaters, she
suggested that necks have 33%-40% of "K" sts as their circumference. Lots
of knitters have found the 33% a bit snug, and for most body-fitting
sweaters, they are right.  But, when we are working with an oversized
sweater, or in this case an oversized sweater with lots of cabling, the
33% neck gives us a good fit, even STILL a bit oversized. But, I like 35%,
and so that is what I used. 

Necessary math...35% of K = .35 x 276 sts = 96.6 sts = 96 (since we need
an even number for K1,P1 ribbing). Our sweater needs to end up with 96 sts
before we start the neck ribbing. 

In Post #20, we found that once we put all the body sts and sleeve sts on
one needle (leaving the underarm sts on holders) we had a total of 356
sts.  And we proceeded to knit them together on the one needle as Round 1
of the yoke. 

More math...356 yoke sts - 96 needed neck sts = 260 sts to decrease.  Is
260 sts divisible by 8?...yea, 32.5 times, but we need to have it divide
evenly, so back to the board... 

Let's change our neck to 100 sts (I like them bigger).

356 yoke sts - 100 neck sts = 256 sts to decrease. 256 sts / 8 sts/round =
32 rounds of decrease. Ok, we are in! 

Over the next 47 rounds we need to work 32 rounds in the raglan decrease,
15 rounds evenly (32 + 15 = 47 rounds), and we need to work in a neck
scoop so that our sweater fits well and doesn't choke us (hah). How we
space all that work turns our sweater into a custom fit job, so watch for
the next post when I will make it EASY AS PIE! (or is that...easy as
eating pie?) 

Claudia knitting at Countrywool overlooking Blue Hill in the Hudson Valley
of NY State in the USA
Countrywool@berk.com
get the complete Anyknitter's Revolving Aran Network (A.R.A.N.)pattern
at: Esther's Knitting Page   http://www.cs.oswego.edu/~ebozak/knit