Do you use a walking foot when sewing silnylon?

[Monte Masterson]

Sometimes no matter how precisely I cut and fold silnylon , I often can’t get the seams to sew even. I end up with waves and not a professional look. I use a 70/10 needle and Gutterman Tera 60 thread. Not too much tension. .

Thoughts please

[Monte Masterson]

I meant to say Tera 80 thread in the OP (typo),

[James Marco]

Nope, never use it for two layers of sil. But, with mesh between, I do. Ironing doesn’t work all that well. I find that a third seam just to tack the fabric together helps when rolling it (flat seams.) It gets buried inside when rolling so it doesn’t show, but it adds a slight bit of weight. Hems and center seams all get rolled. Reinforcement patches get folded over once, then stitched, BEFORE sewing them on. Everything gets a coat of silicone caulk/mineral spirits (around 20-30:1) when it is set up for the first time. For packs, I load them heavily with news paper before coating. Waterproof tarps are a must, but the packs often leak anyway. Even with DCF/cuben they leak a bit. I often make a few rock sacks out of scraps, these I don’t bother coating, they get pretty chewed up.

[Ken Thompson]

Cause and fix of puckering

http://www.amannusa.com/pdf/nahtkraeuslen_gb.pdf

[Jerry Adams]

Maybe put a little tension on the fabric.  Pull the fabric coming out of the machine.  Pull back a little the fabric going into the machine.  If you pull too much it will shorten or lengthen the stitch length, you don’t want to do that.  Or break the needle.

[Elliott Wolin]

Walking feet on Ebay are fairly inexpensive, they help somewhat.  I still pull from both sides and try not to cause the stitch length to vary (alas it always does, sigh…).  I’ve read that a teflon foot helps.

[Edward John M]

Roger C recommended a roller foot but on my machine it didn’t help a lot.

[Roger Caffin]

Roller foot plus lots of pins plus tension.
Works just fine for me and all my gear.

Cheers

[Craig B]

Yeah, material slippage has come up before in various threads.  There was some good discussion and techniques in a thread I started a while ago:

Industrial Needle Feed Sewing Machine

That would be the ultimate tool for eliminating slippage, but pricey and cumbersome.  Quite a few other tricks were shared by others though.  Oh, and the Mara 80 (70?) is probably a fair amount too big for the 70/10 needle.  Maybe try the 120.

[Aaron]

I’ve experimented with some old industrial needle feed machines with sil and other light nylon – it doesn’t necessarily solve all problems (I’ve repaired some broken machines I found on craigslist).  In some cases, depending on how the machine is setup it’s even more problematic than a lightweight drop feed machine.  I’ve come to the conclusion that most factories use pullers to feed lightweight material – basically a motorized wheel at the back of the machine that keeps pace with the front feeding mechanisms.

Your best bet is using one hand to feed the material from behind the needle and one in front, keeping it taut and doing your best to work with the feed dogs and not against them.  It takes some practice.

[Roger Caffin]

Not even silnylon but unproofed UL nylon for the inner tent – but tensioned and with roller foot. Also works well to avoid puckering.

Cheers

[Jerry Adams]

Hmmm…  rollerfoot… my machine came with some little doodads that I never understood, maybe one of them is a rollerfoot?  I’ll have to go find them…

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Jerry

The roller foot is what I use 90% of the time. Worth having.

Cheers

[Jerry Adams]

If I don’t have one I could buy one, thanks

[Edward John M]

My beloved wifes new Pfaff works well without any additional foot etc but I am not, NOT,  allowed to use it and I can’t afford to buy one

 

[Monte Masterson]

Craig B, thanks for the reply. however I’m not sure you’re aware of Guterman Tera 80. It’s considerably thinner than the Mara 70, yet very strong. I love it. It even fits into a 60/8 needle (that I use for 7d silnylon).

I’m going to purchase a walking foot for my Janome My Style 100 machine. It cost $50. I’m just having too much trouble getting French felled seams to look right. I’ll ask about a rolling foot when I get to the Janome store. Thanks.

 

[Jerry Adams]

I ordered this https://www.sewingpartsonline.com/roller-foot-janome-new-home-singer-p60499.aspx

$20

don’t know if they’ll ship it efficiently or if it will work

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Jerry

The roller foot looks OK, but it needs a special mounting attachment to hold it. The roller foot clips onto it. If you have this, fine, otherwise you will need to buy one. It seems that a lot of the more recent feet have transitioned to this industry-standard attachment.

Ha – that Janome foot also fits the Elna machines, like mine. :)

Cheers

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