Sock Sizing

Understanding the stitch capabilities on your machine

This is a common concern for persons using a circular sock knitting machine - how best to create a sock to the size you want.

Certainly one can just ‘wing it’ and knit a pair of socks using whatever settings the machine is set at, and guess. The sock that comes off the machine may or may not be the correct foot length, it may or may not fit snug and sock-like on your foot. But then again it may happen to fit - but does it fit well and can you reproduce it in the future? Probably not

BUT what if you want to be able to create socks to size (or as close as you can) without having to just guess?

When we make a sock we don’t make a sock exactly to the size of the foot. Suck needs to have a bit of stretch or what is called negative ease in order to fit the foot correctly. So even though you may look at a finished sock and think it’s the right size you actually need to be able to stretch it slightly in order to know what the actual correct size is. Here are some examples.

I feel your first step is to create a stitch gauge (two actually) for each cylinder you will be using.
Using a standard yarn weight you will more often use to create something which can be washed/dried and even something that can be left unwashed, I feel is the best tools to refer to with regards to knitting which has been rested and now able to be measured.

Any sock that has just come off the machine will still need to rest in order to know what its actual size is. Because the knitting has had weight and it has been stretched out during the working of your sock you simply cannot know the final size. You also can’t perfectly determine the size of a sock until after you’ve close to toe but you can get close please note from these photos this black and white sock is actually a size 7 women’s but as you can see when on the size Ruler it shows as a size 5.5 but know this sock is just laying there there is no stretch to it and as a sock needs to have some stretch or negative ease in order to fit so this makes sense. Because each knitted fibre will have a slightly different stretch to it depending on it’s fibre content this would be why some people choose to stay with one type of yarn or one year and maker. I know that if I use this yarn once again but in a slightly different colour there it’s a higher probable chance I can guess closer to the correct size I need by adding or subtracting around maybe 10 stitches per size I need to change and then adjust from there.

My preferred FREE Sock size ruler chart can be found: Men - Women - Kids

What is especially great about this ruler chart is you can put the actual persons foot on it to quickly determine the correct size. If you have printed this chart you can laminate it and make that easier to accomplish hygienically

Below are 4 pages from a Griswold Circular Sock Machine manual for reference - from Page 46. MANUAL IS FOUND HERE. Note that without knowing the rows per inch used here to determine number of rows, simply working X rows as noted on the chart won’t produce the same sized sock referenced in the chart.