What am I doing wrong?

[Dib]

When I load a quilt top I can get it nice and tight with no wrinkles. But the outside edges have some slack that I end up pinning to make it tighter. Same goes with the backing. Nice and tight, straight, perfect only the outside edges tend to have some slack I end up pinning. What am I doing wrong. It does always stitch out well but I am afraid one day I will take a quilt off the frame and it will just fly away.:o

[rcck00]

When I have this problem, I re-roll onto the take up rollers, then roll back to position to start quilting. It always takes up the slack on the edges. I don't know why, it's just always seemed like magic to me!:cool:

[Quilting Heidi]

Dib,

I always roll first onto the take-up roller and then onto the front bar. Deloa taught me to do it that way and you can really workout problem in your backer. Sometimes you might have to roll back and forth a time or two to make really bad backer behave. For the top I always lay it over my take-up bar and then roll onto the front upper bar. I watch to make sure my seams are lined up on the bar and not going askew. Seems to solve most of my problems.

[stitchinsally]

Dib,

It you don't think it is because the backing and/or quilt are not square, I discovered, since it was happening on almost every backing other then maybe lap size and therefore couldn't be always blamed on unsquare backs & tops, that part of my problem was that when the dealer set up my machine, they didn't set it up square. Some of it you might be able to eyeball but, we also got out the tape measure and discovered it was off by over 1/2 inch. First, go to the ends of the table and look at each of the 4 bars (take up bars). Is the distance between the bars and the horizontal table leg of similar distance? If not, adjust them. Second, on the front of the table, is an eye bolt which the front backing roller goes thru. Check the right and left sides of the table to confirm they are of similar distance of threads of the eyebolt showing. If not, adjust those. Those adjustment have certainly helped some of my loose edges compared to the rest of the quilt.

I was going to post some pictures to try to help but, I'm kindof dense in that area and don't see who to post them when I'm replying to a message. I'll see if I can send you an e-mail or u2 with the pictures. No promises though.

Hope this gives you some place to start.

[Dib]

Oh, I love you girls! I will do all of the above! Thank you so much to share your knowledge. This Lenni even makes my mistakes look good - really. But sometimes I can see things I just don't know about. This will make me a better quilter! I'll post later!

[Mary Beth]

Also, which way is the seam on the back going....horizontal or vertical? If the seam is going the same direction of the bars, I get a nice flat back. But if they customer put the seam going vertical it causes those saggy sides.

[Bonnie]

I've also been known to get saggy sides when the borders are put on wrong...more border than center....and I've also gotten baggy centers when people cut the borders from the length of the fabric instead of going across. There isn't any give when they are cut lengthwise and the centers are all over the place with bias cuts so they aren't so tight... so I really hate it when they are cut lengthwise, I would much rather deal with across cut borders, but that's just me, I kow that there are others that want them the other direction.

[Dib]

Hmmmmm, there is a vertical seam on this quilt. Never thought about it before.

[DawnCavanaugh]

Dib,

Any time you have seams "wrapping" around the rollers, be sure to work them tightly, as if you are trying to compress the three layers of the quilt on every seam. Grasp the seam and twist it right on the roller, tightening it firmly.

The seams in a quilt "build up" as the quilt wraps around the roller. Since there aren't any seams in the borders, the edges of the quilt seem to droop as opposed to the center. This is also true of backing fabric when the seam or seams wrap around the the roller. The center gets tighter, but the edges droop. Work that seam tightly around the roller as well.

If you do this on every "revolution" of the quilt, by the time you get to the end the quilt edge will lay nice and flat. One way to check if you are putting enough "wrap" on the seams is to allow the unpinned edge to fall next to your floor (the end that will eventually get attached to the pick up roller). Assuming you floor is level, the unpinned edge will align straight along your floor. If the center seams aren't worked enough, you'll see the left and right edges dragging near the floor.

Give this a try, and see if it helps reduce that trouble.