Oh, My Goodness! The Thread Police!!!!
It seems to me that every quilter should be afraid of someone who wants to offer a "law" of some kind about fabrics or threads. Sara wrote "Now I'm told by a local long arm quilter that they do not use 100% cotton, as it has too much lint. They use cross wound thread that is about 70% poly and 30% cotton."
Some cotton thread is very linty. Some cotton thread has almost no lint shedding at all. (I should know because my black vintage Singer is a good witness to lintiness.)
A longarm machine works at a much higher rate of speed than a standard domestic machine and so you are comparing a race car to a street car .... of course a longarm machine needs a "tougher" thread that is crosswound on a cone spool to handle the stress of going at 1800 stitches per minute.
Sometimes (not always, but sometimes) when a quilter is frustrated by thread breakage it's a problem of poor fit with the needle and the thread. Take the needle out of the machine. Take the needle and thread it with the thread you want to use and see if the needle slides nicely up and down the thread as you tip the thread up and down like a see-saw. They need to "play nice" in order to sew nice.
Judy
Some cotton thread is very linty. Some cotton thread has almost no lint shedding at all. (I should know because my black vintage Singer is a good witness to lintiness.)
A longarm machine works at a much higher rate of speed than a standard domestic machine and so you are comparing a race car to a street car .... of course a longarm machine needs a "tougher" thread that is crosswound on a cone spool to handle the stress of going at 1800 stitches per minute.
Sometimes (not always, but sometimes) when a quilter is frustrated by thread breakage it's a problem of poor fit with the needle and the thread. Take the needle out of the machine. Take the needle and thread it with the thread you want to use and see if the needle slides nicely up and down the thread as you tip the thread up and down like a see-saw. They need to "play nice" in order to sew nice.
Judy
posted by Judy in Ohio @ 10:08 PM
2 Comments:
At September 12, 2007 at 11:07 PM ,
Phyllis in Minnesota said...
Judy: I often times feel the threads that are recommended by the quilt stores or operators of professional quilting machines are the ones that provide the most profit to their bottom line. Of course the bottom line is what keeps them in business but sometimes that line is more important to them than the truth. We just need to use what works best for us and like you said - check your needle, tension and make sure you have the same thread in the bobbin. Enjoy!!
Phyllis in Minnesota
At September 13, 2007 at 3:51 PM ,
Sara in Florida said...
Thanks everyone. I never thought about the speed of the long arm machine. I'll try take everyone's advice! Right now I'm sure I need to do some dusting of both machines, and clean out the lint.
Thanks again,
Sara
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