As spinners, we like to keep our wheels close at hand. Which means that we tend to take them along when we go places. We haul them to guild meetings, to workshops, to fiber festivals, to friend’s homes, to demonstrations, to spin-ins. We take them on vacation. If it’s impractical to take a wheel along on an outing, then we take at least one spindle. But just packing up the wheel or the spindle isn’t the end of it. We need to take our fibers and our small but essential spinning tools along too.

Fibers are easy to carry along. All that’s needed to pack a nice supply of fibers for travel is a bag.
The bag can be attached to the wheel in many ways: tied, bungied, or just hooked over a convenient upright bit of the wheel. Stuck down between the legs of the wheel, our supply of fibers serves as a nice bit of padding during transport.

Small spinning tools present a different problem. We want to keep them where they are convenient and contained so they don’t get wanderlust and are protected from damage. We need a tool kit. Besides keeping our small tools contained and handy, tool kits are also god sends to multiple wheel owners. One tool kit can easily be transferred from wheel to wheel thus saving the money which would otherwise be spent on duplicate sets of small tools.

Small spinning tool kits can be made of a wide variety of things: A piece of fabric (commercial or hand woven) can be fashioned into a bag; hand spun yarn can be knit and felted into a little bucket; a pretty basket will work - a handle can always be added, a knit and lined bag is nice; an old fancy tin can be embellished and a handle added; even a plastic pencil pouch can be made into a tool kit. The only real consideration is making sure that your tool kit is the right size for holding all of the little spinning tools you like to have on hand.

What goes into your tool kit depends entirely on which small tools you MUST have at hand while spinning and this may well vary depending on your spinning venue. When spinning at home, you can always put your hands on needed items but when spinning away from home it’s best to be prepared with more than you think you’ll need.

When spinning away from home, I have found that:
1. Someone will break a drive band or tension band and not have replacement materials.
2. Someone will not have brought oil for their wheel.
3. Someone will have a wheel with a part that is either too loose or too tight and needs to be adjusted for the wheel to spin well.
4. No one will have a knife, tape, scissors, or any tools that may be needed to fix the problem.

So my full tool kit contains a lot of stuff.

First, there is my actual small spinning tool kit. This contains things I might use when actually spinning:
1. Oil and a small rag. (In a Zip lock baggie)

2. An orifice hook.
3. An inch gauge.
4. A grist gauge.
5. A twist angle gauge.
6. A Mabel Ross lap cloth.
7. A small scissors or knife.
8. My project control card.

This little bag is kept hanging from whatever wheel I’m using at the time and is easy to move from wheel to wheel or to grab and toss into my large tool kit which contains:

1. Extra drive band materials (heavy string) - enough for at least 2 double drive wheels and one great wheel plus extra tension band materials (a couple rubber bands and a bit of finer cotton yarn).
2. A roll of teflon tape - great for tightening up loose parts quickly and easily.
3. An actual tool kit, pocket sized which contains screwdrivers (slotted and phillips), an awl, a small hammer, and a tiny wrench. A full sized pliers and a set of allen wrenches complete the compliment of tools.
4. Several toothpicks - these are handy should someone break one of the little pegs which hold leather flyer bearings in place. (Yes, it has happened!)
5. Snack sized zip lock bags for holding small samples of fibers or oil bottles which have decided to leak.
6. Tape. Someone always needs a piece of tape for something.
7. Paper and a pencil.

Of course, if you’re taking a spindle then there is no need for most of this stuff. At the most you need:
1. A distaff of some type. I like a hand held one, some spinners prefer a wrist model.
2. A nostepinde if your spindle is close to full and may need to be wound off while you’re out.

I keep these tools right in my spindle bag along with a supply of fibers and it’s easy to just grab it on my way out the door.