Does anyone know about knitting machines?

[Hadenoughofthisbullshit]

Hi, I’m wondering if anyone knows about knitting machines the table top ones? I can knit but I’m pretty impatient and haven’t progressed passed hats, scarfs, baby blankets and plain baby clothes. I can do cables and some simple patterns, but I get very frustrated when I go wrong. I can’t crochet either.

Is a knitting machine the answer or are they just as frustrating? I don’t have much time in the evenings with little kids so do I have enough time to learn to use one proficiently in a few months if I only practice for a few hours a week?

I’m a bit confused by the different gages can you get an all rounder or do you need different machines for thin and chunky projects?

Also most of them are not made anymore so do I just get a silver Reed or take a chance on an eBay one?

I have tried a very cheap kids circular knitting machine and I found it incredibly frustrating as it just kept getting unexplainable holes in the knitting, so I ended up throwing it away. Am I right in thinking that the addi express etc just do stocking and garter stitch? Or can you put patterns in?

The more I think about this the more it seems like a pipe dream, am I right?

Anyone?

I only just saw your post so this might be too late, but my DM recently upgraded to a Silver Reed 150 and loves it. She had an old Bond machine from the 80's before but it was way more limited in the gague range, it only had 3 settings.

She says she wishes she'd done it ages ago. She's done fairisle, lace, cables, icords, 3 needle bind offs and tuck stitches on it so far. It's lower range is limited to about 4ply in theory but she's done a top for me in lace in a loose gauge.

There's a Fruity Knitting episode on machine knitting that convinced her to take the plunge and buy it if that's any use to you

Thanks so much hadn’t checked the thread in ages as it went down the watching list. Thanks for your help. The silver reef 150 is the cheaper one isn’t? Good to hear it can do so much stuff.

No worries, it is, I think she would have ideally liked a fancier one but she couldn't justify it to herself!

@Hadenoughofthisbullshit

Hi, I’m wondering if anyone knows about knitting machines the table top ones? I can knit but I’m pretty impatient and haven’t progressed passed hats, scarfs, baby blankets and plain baby clothes. I can do cables and some simple patterns, but I get very frustrated when I go wrong. I can’t crochet either.

Is a knitting machine the answer or are they just as frustrating? I don’t have much time in the evenings with little kids so do I have enough time to learn to use one proficiently in a few months if I only practice for a few hours a week?

I’m a bit confused by the different gages can you get an all rounder or do you need different machines for thin and chunky projects?

Also most of them are not made anymore so do I just get a silver Reed or take a chance on an eBay one?

I have tried a very cheap kids circular knitting machine and I found it incredibly frustrating as it just kept getting unexplainable holes in the knitting, so I ended up throwing it away. Am I right in thinking that the addi express etc just do stocking and garter stitch? Or can you put patterns in?

The more I think about this the more it seems like a pipe dream, am I right?

I got one of those circular ones as well thinking it was the answer to all my problems. I did get a few hats and scarves but I found it tricky enough and like you got some unexplainable holes so I've just went back to plain old knitting needles! It may be much slower but I'm content enough passing an hour or so knitting. I cant crochet either!

@itsgrand was it one of those addi express ones?

[quote Hadenoughofthisbullshit]@itsgrand was it one of those addi express ones?[/quote]
yes it was. It was ok but a bit too fiddley and the casting off didn't always go to plan for me.

Thanks for that, I thought because they were a lot more expensive than the circular one I bought, they might work better. Sorry to hear that’s not the case.