ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to develop an understanding of the development of ring spinning, showing that there were technological reasons for its slow introduction. It deals with the development of the ring frame and its origins as a replacement not for the mule but for the throstle. The chapter examines how although by contrast with the mule, the ring frame is in essence a simple automatic machine, it had a number of serious dynamic problems, particularly that of spindle balancing, which needed to be solved before it could spin more than a restricted range of yarns and seriously challenge mule. Mule spinning is first considered to show how the original hand mule was a machine of great versatility. Mule spinning was in origin a totally manual process. The advantage of this was that the application of human skill enabled a wide range of yarns to be produced, but the disadvantage was that productivity was limited by the power of human muscles.
