PurlbedRib › Racked fabrics
Racked rib with needles out: zigzag and straight wales
Columns that zigzag sit beside columns that run dead straight. Taking needles out of work in stripes or blocks gives striped or checked racked fabrics (抽条扳花, 方格扳花). A front-bed wale only zigzags if the back-bed needle opposite it knits, because that is what pulls it sideways when the bed moves.
- Two beds
Machine types that can knit it
Demo swatch
Drawn for: Double-bed hand flat (V-bed)Approximate preview worked out from the bed chart, not a photo.
Carriage settings on a Dubied
Worked out from the demo chart above: set the needles, then the cams for each run of rows. Change the number of rows to suit your sample.
| Step | What to do | How |
|---|---|---|
| Step 1 | Set the needles | as drawn in the bed chart · front 36 / back 20 needles in work · half pitch (needles between) |
| Step 2 | Set the beds | Needles between each other (half pitch); racking handle at 0. |
| Step 3 | Cast on | Set-up: comb up between the beds, all K/M cams on 1, tension loose, carriage on the right. Knit 1 row, release the comb. Welt: K/M cams 0 1 / 1 0 (tubular). Knit at least 2 rows. Hang the weights, then set the cams for the fabric. |
| Step 4 | Knit rows 1–36 (36 rows) | Carriage: 2 passes: both beds knit (rack 0); 2 passes: both beds knit (rack +1); repeat these passes 9 times Tension (stitch size): your usual tension Yarn: Yarn A |
| Step 5 | Cast off | Cast off by hand, or knit a few rows of waste yarn and take the piece off (as your workshop teaches). |
How to read the cross
- The four quarters are the carriage: top rear bed, bottom front bed, left moving left, right moving right.
- Corners, knit/miss cam: 1 knits; ½ knits on high butts only and misses low butts; 0 is out of work.
- Diamond, tucking cam: 0 no tuck; ½ low butts tuck, high butts knit; 1 all needles tuck. An empty diamond is all 0.
- Numbers on the line are tension dials, 0 tightest to 20 loosest. A + means looser than your usual size.
- Set-out: long tick high butt, short tick low butt, dot out of action.
Steps
- Cast on with the back-bed needles out of work where a column should stay straight.
- Knit 2 rows.
- Rack to +1.
- Knit 2 rows.
- Rack to
- Repeat 2–5.
The full card
- What it looks like
- Columns that zigzag sit beside columns that run dead straight. Taking needles out of work in stripes or blocks gives striped or checked racked fabrics (抽条扳花, 方格扳花).
- How it behaves
- Texture and small puckers where zigzag and straight columns meet. Reversing the rack direction biases the stitches, and that can be used for raised shapes.
- How it works
- A front-bed wale only zigzags if the back-bed needle opposite it knits, because that is what pulls it sideways when the bed moves. If that back needle is out of work the wale has no connection and runs straight. So the needle set-out decides which columns move.
- Machines
- Double bed with a racking handle. Any machine: the pattern comes from the needle set-out, not from selection, so a Dubied can do it.
- Parameters
- Group widths from your design (4 + 4 in the demo). Rack 1 needle every 2 rows here; test larger racks and different row counts, since the number of rows between racks changes the depth of the fold.
- Steps
- 1) Cast on with the back-bed needles out of work where a column should stay straight. 2) Knit 2 rows. 3) Rack to +1. 4) Knit 2 rows. 5) Rack to 0. 6) Repeat 2–5.
- Charting
- Bed chart with double-jersey columns and front-only columns, rack position marked at each change.
- Limits and common problems
- A wrong needle set-out collides on the rack at needles-opposite pitch: check clearance by hand first. Edge needles can crash when racking is tight; push them down first.
- Combines with
- racked-full-rib, vertical-rib, rib-jersey-relief.
- Pieces and assembly
- Panels with vertical stripes of movement, check fabrics.
Written in our own words from machine manuals, knitting references and swatching. Knit a test swatch before a whole piece.