The Thistle Spinning Machine design has been in the works for many years.  Thirty-five years ago,  all of our wheels were totally traditional in design, and the spinning community was more geared to spinning as demonstration of history.  Yet we saw the limitations of those traditional designs and felt that there was little on the market for spinners who were more interested in high-volume production of fine yarn and less in strict adherance to traditional design.  There has been a slow movement towards modern European styles and we now see many wheel designs which are decidedly non-traditional both in style and materials.   We still have the expertise to build traditional wheels in most any configuration you want, and do occasional restoration of antique wheels for our friends. But our focus has shifted toward the production of this new design.  As all our wheels are assembled one at a time, we do have the ability to adjust to some degree, for your needs or artistic taste.  What you will find is the standard machine, parts for which we produce in small batches and then assemble.  So, we are somewhere between custom and mass-production and hope to be able to be more efficient this way.  We still have the ability to adjust the design for your individual preferences.  So just give us a call!  We hope to eventually find a clever way to incorporate a simple and durable level-wind system into the flyer but to date have not been able to invent anything which we feel is rugged and durable enough.  We will keep trying!