Single to Double: Converting and Refurbing a Lendrum Folding Wheel

Barns Sale, Ebay, Swap Meet, Craig’s List, Spin-in, Thrift Store- Spinners work hard to find wheels wherever we go. An old wheel found at a great price creates some of the best stories, even when they end with “it was totally unusable-“ but it is way better when we can end it with- “…and they sent it back and now it is my favorite wheel!”

Caroline has a great end to her story now, she bought her wheel five years ago with all of the accessories, but could never get it to work. Losing hope she set it aside to gather dust. Until she saw one of Kyle’s videos about how the Lendrum works and she contacted us about getting her wheel to work, she was also hoping to make it a double treadle.

This often happens to owners of Lendrum’s single treadle folding wheel, myself included: wishing we could give our wheel a second life and treadle. Caroline sent her wheel to Kyle and this is how we here at Paradise changed part of its story…

Kyle, here at Paradise Fibers understands spinners and is willing to rise to the challenges presented by different wheels, like adapting the single treadle to a double. In the past this has been an impossible feat; however, his goal is to make these dreams a reality.

There are a few different designs for the Lendrum Single Treadle Folding Wheel, depending on when your wheel came out. Caroline’s wheel is older one of the original folding wheels of Gord Lendrum with a hand burned GL on the bottom. Kyle took the challenge of giving new life to her wheel.

Caroline’s single treadle design connects the treadles across the top of the two treadles, when the glued bar was removed each treadle moved independently.
The biggest issue with the wheel is the mechanics of how the double treadle was designed to work with a pivot arm, supported with a pivot arm pin.

The pin was fabricated to match with the pivot arm and the hole was counter sunk to be flush and clean with the back of the wheel, keeping the smooth lines of the wheel. The pivot arm is mounted with bushings from our wheel to keep smooth treadling. The pivot arm is balanced and smooth allowing for balanced treadling, allowing for even effort between peddles.
Kyle’s greatest concern with the wheel finding the perfect location for the pivot arm pin, which with this older Lendrum was tighter than expected. There is clearance between the treadle upright and the pivot arm when the wheel is folded. The close clearance between the wheel and the pivot arm post makes changing the drive band a delicate task as it is rolled into the grove but it is totally doable!

Originally the wheel’s hub was driven with a wire acting as a footman arm and connecter, attaching the treadle to the wheel hub but with the addition of a pivot arm, Kyle used the standard Lendrum footman connecters on both treadles and added the footman arm.

To finish the assembly the bolt that had attached the wire footman to the hub was removed and Kyle fabricated a pin to match the footman arm assembly!

Finally Kyle worked to make the wheel the smoothest even spinning experience for Caroline, so he adjusted the clearance and added bushings to the treadles so there was no shift when treadling.

Caroline has her wheel, and has spun some lovely alpaca silk blend she hand carded, that came out smooth and lovely. “My wheel now has a story, one that I will tell over and over. It also has a name first mentioned by Kyle and picked up by my sons: “Bad Boy.” I”m still laughing.”

Overall this was an amazing and fun project. We have and excellent wood shop where we build our own wheels. We want our customers to have the best fiber experience thy can. Every spinner loves their wheel, and the Paradise Fibers family wants to keep you spinning on the wheel that your love. Kyle and our full service wood shop here at Paradise Fibers and can fix just about any wheel you throw at us. If you have questions call or email anytime 1-888-320-7746 or www.paradisefibers.com

PS. Kyle continues to rise to the occasion he spent my day off converting my newer Single Treadle Lendrum into a Double treadle wheel! He calls it like a unicorn and I really feel that special when I do spin on it! check out his short video on it1