Date Night With Jack the Ripper: A Directional Tension Thriller With a Happy Ending

Friday Night with Jack the Ripper

You should have seen the look on my husband's face when I told him I was ripping stitches out of Anders' graduation quilt.  You'd think I just told him that I fed one of our neighbors to the dog or something.  It was all there in his eyes -- shock, horror, revulsion, "how could you do this to me, to us, and to our family?!" blah blah blah.  But a quilter's gotta do what a quilter's gotta do, and sometimes you just have to put on your Big Girl panties and reach for the seam ripper.

So I finished quilting Anders' graduation quilt late on Tuesday night, but when I took it off the frame and flipped it over, I saw a couple of spots where I wasn't happy with the stitching on the back of the quilt.  I know better than to make rash decisions when I'm tired, so I walked away from the quilt and decided to come back and triage in the daylight, after a good night's sleep.  Sometimes I can pick out and restitch small sections of quilting invisibly, knotting and burying the thread tails so you'd never know any "quilt surgery" had happened there.  This was not one of those times.

Tuesday Night, When I Thought I Was Finished

Inspection on Wednesday morning revealed directional tension problems in the first two rows of quilting, about 15" across the entire top of the quilt.  

What the Heck are Directional Tension Problems?

Oh, I'm so glad you asked!  

Always Gonna Be an Uphill Mountain; Always Gonna Wanna Make It Move: Of Small Victories in Custom Quilting

I finished the background quilting in the first row of 4" blocks and moved down to the second and third rows yesterday.  This is VERY slow going, and I'm so glad I bought that adjustable height saddle stool on Amazon so I can sit at my long arm frame while I work on the tedious background fill quilting.  I've been using the stool when I need to unpick stitches with a seam ripper, too -- but hopefully there won't be any more of that with this quilt!  Hope I didn't just jinx myself!!

It's so exciting, though, seeing my quilting design start to take shape on the quilt  in front of me.  

I'm trying to figure out pathways for quilting that minimize stops and starts as much as possible.  I'm also really glad that I decided to add those 1/4" unquilted channels around the background fills, because I love how they define the overall diamond shape that I'm trying to bring out of the piecing.  But, for those who thought maybe I'd get this completely finished by the end of this week, that is definitely NOT going to happen.  Still hopeful for finishing the quilting by the end of July, but I'm not going to stress about the deadline.  As Miley Cyrus once sang, "It's not about how fast I get there, it's not about what's waiting on the other side.  It's the CLIMB!"  ;-)

One more mystery of long arm quilting has been solved for me, this time by a helpful member of the APQS Owner's Forum.  I posted this picture of how, when I was quilting my ruler work border, I was getting gorgeous stitches in one direction that would turn into almost flatline on the top of the quilt when I had to quilt back in the opposite direction.  It was infuriating me, and I couldn't figure out why it was happening.  So this other APQS owner in the forum responded that my problem might be caused by tension that was balanced, but was too loose overall, top and bottom.  He suggested that I set my bobbin tension to around 200 with the TOWA gauge and then adjust my top tension to rebalance the stitch.  Well, I had my bobbin tension set at around 160 before.  I tightened my bobbin tension to 200, bypassing the little pigtail guide on my M class bobbin case, and then increased my top tension accordingly until the stitch looked good top and bottom.  Well, this completely solved my problem, and it never would have occurred to me if it hadn't been for the advice of a stranger.  Gotta love the Internet!

Since I have so little to share with you today, I'm throwing in a bonus: Behold, Samwise the Brave and Snuggly Rottweiler Puppy, 8 months old and about 98 pounds:

I would be getting so much more quilting done if I wasn't busy playing tug and throwing tennis balls all over the house.  This is why we can't have nice things anymore... but having nice things is totally overrated!

Happy Friday and happy weekend, everyone!  I'm linking up with:

FRIDAY

·       Whoop Whoop Fridays at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

·       Finished Or Not Friday at Alycia Quilts

·       Off the Wall Friday at Nina Marie Sayre

SATURDAY

·       UFO Busting at Tish in Wonderland

Remember the Alamo: Why Your Longarm Quilter Won't Let You Use a Bed Sheet for Quilt Backing

Oh my gosh, you guys -- this "easy pantograph" charity quilt is finally done and off my frame.  I'm battered, bloodied and traumatized, but I learned a lot and I survived.  Let's call that a win.  ;-)

"Remember the Alamo," 60 x 80 Charity Quilt Finish

Why Bed Sheets, Drapery Panels and Shower Curtains Make Bad Quilt Backings

I used to think that longarm quilters who refused to accept bed sheets as quilt backings were just being picky quilt snobs, but now I totally understand why a longarmer would have that rule.  The backing for this particular quilt was a cotton/polyester blend, either a sheet or an unlined readymade drapery panel.  It was a tighter weave and a heavier weight than quilting cotton, and no amount of changing tension settings, different size threads, different size needles, begging, pleading, or cursing could coax this fabric into cooperating for consistently balanced stitches.  What's more, the quilt top itself is comprised of lots of different types of fabric, with many of them a heavier weight and tighter weave as well.  If I managed to get the tension looking good on one patch of fabric, it would be off again as soon as the quilting stitches traveled onto a patch of a different kind of fabric.  

Directional Tension Trouble on Bed Sheet Backing: This Is the Best Stitch Quality I Could Achieve

I spent days fiddling with settings, trying to get decent stitch quality with the combination of fabric challenges in this quilt, and I was never able to get something I was truly happy with.  I ended up just doing the best I could, and hopefully that will be good enough.  

Here's The Skinny On Directional Tension Trouble:

Here's what I learned this week!  When your tension looks great in some directions but you have unbalanced tension only when stitching in certain directions, that indicates that your needle is flexing -- bending as the stitch is formed, so the top thread is not meeting up with the bobbin thread in exactly the right place to form a good lock stitch.  What causes needle flex, you may ask?

• The needle is too small.  Thicker needles bend less than skinny needles do -- which is why longarm machines quilt with larger needles than you might use to quilt on your domestic sewing machine.
• The quilt sandwich is stretched too tight on the quilting frame.  This is a common newbie mistake -- the quilt shouldn't be flat and taut like a drum; it needs to drape down around the machine bed and, as you move the machine around on the quilt, it should look like a critter is tunneling around under there.
• The quilter is trying to quilt way too fast and needs to slow down.
• Stitch length is too long.  Longer stitches allow the needle to bend more than shorter stitches.
• Thread Composition: The APQS article I found on directional tension says that cotton thread pulls harder on the needle than a smooth polyester thread does, especially if it's also having to pull through cotton batting.  My So Fine thread is a lint free 100% polyester thread with a matte finish that looks like cotton.  My batting was polyester, but my atypical fabrics were giving resistance to the needle already -- perhaps switching to the slippery-smooth Glide polyester thread would have helped the needle "glide" through this challenging quilt more easily, with less flexing? 
• Batting: Again, according to the APQS article, very dense, like a 100% cotton, is more difficult for the needle to penetrate, and if the batting doesn't have enough loft, there isn't much room for the longarm machine to form that locking stitch.  I don't think my Fairfield low loft polyester batting was a contributing factor this time around, but that's definitely something I'll keep in mind when I'm selecting battings for future quilts.  
• Fabric type and thread count -- this is what was killing me on my charity quilt!  The needle just had to work too hard to punch through that thick, tight fabric weave.  Bed sheets have a much higher thread count and tighter weave than quilting cottons, but beautiful batik quilting cottons have a tighter weave than regular cotton prints and they can be challenging, too.  APQS suggests trying a smaller needle and/or a slippery polyester thread in this situation -- again, maybe the smooth and shiny Glide thread would have been a better choice.  Then again, I was dealing with a very tight weave/high thread count, AND a heavier fabric weight overall with my backing, as well as a quilt top that had some dress weight, bed sheets, and even drapery fabrics.  So a smaller needle would have a high risk of BREAKING, especially since I was quilting "blind" from the back of my machine and couldn't see whether I was approaching bulky seam intersections...    

I chose to use So Fine thread for this project because I thought the matte finish would make my beginner quilting stitches more inconspicuous than the shiny, showy Glide thread, and because I don't happen to have a nice neutral shade of Glide on hand that would have complemented this particular quilt top.  I am realizing that there is more that goes into selecting the best thread for each quilt than just the aesthetics of color and sheen preferences!  Even monopoly invisible thread would have slipped through these tight weaves better than the thread I used.  I'm learning, so it's all good -- and when you look at it from a distance instead of sticking your nose up to the bobbin stitches like you're the Chief Inspector for the Quilt Police, this quilt looks fine:

Floral Meander Pantograph, Front of Quilt

I feel like I did a good job of spacing the pantograph rows so they blend together into one overall pattern instead of quilted "stripes" with obvious demarcations between each pass of stitching.  The back looks okay from a distance, too:

Backing (Bed Sheet) Side of Floral Meander Charity Quilt

It Had To Be A Solid Color to Show Every Imperfection, Too...

This pantograph design is called Floral Meander.

Smoother Curves Than My Last Hand Guided Pantograph Attempt

I do like the way the neutral colored Superior So Fine #50 thread I used blends with most of the fabrics in the quilt top, and I'm getting much better at quilting round shapes from the back of the machine than I did on my first pantograph attempt back in January.  

This charity quilt is only my second try at a hand guided pantograph, and I can see that I'm getting better at staying on the design lines -- the round parts of the design are starting to look rounder and smoother and the "ogre toes" are going away, and as Martha Stewart would say, that's a good thing!

First Pantograph Attempt.  Compare Oval Inside Hook to More Rounded Shape In Prior Photo

Incidentally, the above photo is of a Popcorn LG pantograph that I stitched on a quilt made of all quilt shop cotton fabrics with Quilter's Dream Poly batting.  It's a very similar pantograph pattern to the one I used on the charity quilt, yet you can see in this backing-side photo that I was able to stitch the design with beautiful, balanced stitches in ALL directions with my APQS Millenium without any of the directional problems I experienced on the charity quilt.  (The tiny dots of black between stitches are the black batting showing at the needle holes, by the way -- the holes closed up when I washed the quilt).

And so, in my own mind, I have named this charity quilt "Remember the Alamo" because it was a bloody battle (figuratively!) but I fought a good fight and even though I wasn't successful, I never gave up.  Also I will REMEMBER my Alamo and never, ever load another bed sheet/drapery panel/shower curtain on my longarm frame EVER AGAIN!

So I have one more of these charity tops waiting to be quilted that was pieced by the same church group.  It has the same 1/2" seam allowances and the same variety of fabrics in the top, and I'll be using the same low loft poly batting.  However, for this top, I purchased a length of cotton quilt backing from JoAnn's with a nice, busy paisley print to camouflage any oopsies from the back side.  My wonderful APQS dealer suggested that, instead of following a paper pantograph from the back side of my machine, I quilt this one with a freehand allover meander from the front of the machine instead, so I can at least avoid stitching through bulky seam intersections and see what's happening while I'm quilting.  I think that's a great idea.  What I have NOT yet decided is whether I'll tackle the second charity top right away.  I might decide to load up a sample quilt with just plain muslin top and backing, "normal" batting that I would typically use for one of my own quilt projects, and use that practice piece to get my tensions tweaked again just so, practice that allover meander a little bit, and rebuild my confidence after my Battle of the Alamo...

Meanwhile, I'm linking up with:
• Let’s Bee Social at www.sewfreshquilts.blogspot.ca/ 
• Midweek Makers at www.quiltfabrication.com/
• WOW WIP on Wednesday at www.estheraliu.blogspot.com 
• Needle and Thread Thursday at www.myquiltinfatuation.blogspot.com/  
• Finish It Up Friday at www.sillymamaquilts.com 
• Whoop Whoop Fridays at www.confessionsofafabricaddict.blogspot.com 

• Finished Or Not Friday at www.busyhandsquilts.blogspot.com/ 

Longarm Learning Curve: Directional Tension Troubles

Good Morning, Lovelies!  I've had both teenagers home from school since Thursday due to the Red Cross taking over their high school as an emergency shelter for Hurricane  Tropical Storm Florence evacuees.  Here in Charlotte, we're expecting heavy rains and flooding, and I'm hoping we don't lose power because I need to do some SEWING!

Charity Quilt is On the Frame, Ready for Quilting

I've been stalled out with some Technical Difficulties for the past week.  I know we learn more from these challenges than we do when it's all smooth sailing, but it's still frustrating when something is obviously set up wrong and I can't for the life of me figure out what it is.  I volunteered to quilt a couple of tops for the charity quilters at my church, thinking that it would be a great way to serve AND get some more practice with my longarm quilting machine (which I have not touched since I finished my Tabby Mountain Disco Kitties quilt at the end of May).

So I picked up two tops from the church quilters over a month ago, including batting and backings for each, and then I proceeded to panic about them because:

1. The backings they gave me are sheets.  One is a cotton/poly blend and the other is definitely synthetic, with kind of a microfiber silkiness to it.  I know right off the bat that, because bed linens are woven with a much higher thread count and much tighter weave than quilting cotton, these backings are going to make it much harder for me to get a decent looking quilting stitch.
2. Since this group normally ties all of their quilts rather than quilting them, the batting they gave me is a high loft polyester, and what's more, the batting has a really uneven consistency.  In the thickest spots, the batting is nearly three times as thick as it is in the thinnest spots.  I have never seen anyone use batting like this for machine quilting and I worry that it is one of those "not suitable for the longarm" battings that, like the bed sheet backings, will introduce all kinds of additional challenges with shifting quilt layers as my presser foot snowplowed through the slippery, super puffy quilt sandwich.
3. As for the quilt tops themselves, they are not quite like the quilts I piece myself.  Not all of the ladies who serve in this ministry are quilters, so the tops have 1/2" seam allowances instead of 1/4", they are not quite flat and square, and although seams have been pressed to one side, there are places where a more experienced quilter would have done a different pressing plan to reduce bulk where seams intersect.  But my biggest concern is that, like the quilt backings, many of the fabrics used in the quilt tops appear to be sheets, drapery fabric remnants, or scraps of garment fabrics.  

After a couple weeks of agonizing and consulting with several more experienced longarm quilters, I decided to take advantage of the JoAnn Fabrics Labor Day 50% off coupons to give myself a fighting chance with these projects.  I bought two Fairfield Low Loft Polyester battings to replace the thick battings supplied by the church group, and I bought an inexpensive extra wide cotton quilt backing fabric for one of the tops so I wouldn't have to use the slippery microfiber sheet.  I have enough of a learning curve as a beginner without further stacking the odds against myself, right?

Pinning the Quilt Top to Canvas Leader, Occasionally Stabbing Myself With Pins

So I loaded the first quilt on my frame with the new low loft polyester batting and the cotton/poly sheet backing, threaded up my machine with a neutral cream colored So Fine #50 quilting thread, and proceeded to do some test stitching off to the side of the quilt top, on the excess batting and backing.  Stitches looked lovely from the top side, but look at what was going on below deck:

Bobbin Thread Flatlining, But Only When Quilting In Certain Directions

Aaaarrgh!!!  Folks, I am not a woman who is afraid to adjust needle or bobbin tension on a sewing machine.  I understand the science of balanced lock stitch tension, and if I needed a refresher, there are a ton of tension troubleshooting videos and tutorials online to refresh my memory.  This is a different beast -- directional tension problems that only happen when I'm moving the quilting machine away from myself and/or to the left.  After an entire day of fiddling around with top and bobbin tension, I could not see ANY improvement whatsoever.  

The Internet was able to tell me that directional tension problems have nothing to do with top or bobbin tension -- this problem is caused by needle flex and/or bobbin backlash.  I'm using a lightweight cardboard prewound bobbin in a size L bobbin case with the check spring in place just as it should be, so my bobbin shouldn't be spinning backwards when the machine switches direction.  And, as for needle flex, the only recommendations I could find online were to make sure the quilt wasn't stretched too tight on the frame and/or to use a larger needle.  I was already using a size 4.0 needle initially and I had loosened the quilt tension to the point that it was dragging around with the machine head.

I had read that tightly woven fabrics such as batiks and bed sheets can behave better with a SMALLER needle, so I took a couple of new needles out of their packs and just did an informal "stab test" to see how easily each one could penetrate my quilt sandwich.  Sure enough, the 4.0 that performs so beautifully with quilting cottons had some significant resistance trying to go through this charity top made of sheets and drapery fabric.  When I stabbed the needle straight down on top of the quilt, there was a slight hesitation before the needle punched through the fabric.  The size 3.5 needle went right through easily.  And I have to say, after struggling with this project for a few days, I enjoyed randomly stabbing it with needles.

But the needle change didn't solve the directional tension problem, so I finally broke down and put a call in to APQS Tech Support on Wednesday (which I should have done a LONG time ago!).  The first thing they had me do is check that my hopping foot was centered, level, and set at the correct height -- approximately one business card thickness from the stitch plate when the needle is in its lowest position.  I would never in a million years have thought to check that, but my hopping foot was set so low that it was touching the stitch plate in its lowest position and there was no way I could have crammed a business card or even a regular piece of paper underneath the foot.  So we got that set correctly in a matter of minutes with the help of Tech Support, but then I had to run kids to activities before I had a chance to do any further test stitching.

On Thursday evening, I fired up the longarm, said a little prayer, and stitched the following test squiggles:

Most Recent Test Stitches, Top Side View

Lovely stitches from the top side, right?  But this is what the back looks like:

Same Test Stitches, Backing Side View

AAAAARRGH!!!!  It is maddening that the stitches can be so beautifully formed and then just flatline randomly like that.  Well, it's not really random; it's happening only when the machine head is being moved to my left and/or away from me.  

Well, the VERY KIND AND PATIENT woman at APQS Tech Support said that checking the hopping foot height was only the first step on her list of troubleshooting, so I'm not giving up yet!  I just haven't had a chance to call back during business hours yet.  So far in Charlotte all we've seen from Tropical Storm Florence is wind and steady rain.  I'm going out for a walk with my husband as soon as I finish my coffee, and then I'm headed back up to the studio to get Miss Millie straightened out.  I've got her plugged into a hefty UPS so no worries about damaging the machine if there are power irregularities from the storm.

But one thing I really must do is make myself a larger test sandwich off to the side of the quilt that's loaded on the frame, because these little 4" swatches are way too small and I'm running out of room with the excess batting and backing at the sides of the quilt top.  Also, I'm going to make that practice sandwich out of 100% cotton top and bottom, NOT sheets, and scrap batting that I would normally use in one of my own quilts.  Getting beautiful stitches with high quality materials is really my goal, and if the stitch quality is compromised somewhat when I'm quilting through sheets on a charity quilt, so be it.

Wish me luck!