calaquilts Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 Hi There.....I am a newbie and just have a question about diagonal lines. I have been using my millenium for about 4 months now and have just been doing pantos. I love it but now I want to try quilting from the front of the machine. This makes me nervous but I don't want to only do pantos.I have a customer with a king size log cabin quilt. She wants it quilted entirely in diagonal lines. I did this once on my small machine and marked the lines first then sewed it all. Should I do the same with the long arm? or is there a better way to do it? Do I just use my rulers? I have been reading all your helpful hints and they have helped me a great deal. Learning this machine has definately been a challenge but I am enjoying it more and more with each project I complete. I am looking forward to taking some classes next year as I am just learning as I go right now. The quilts I see posted on the forum are a big inspiration and I can only hope that some day I will be as good as all of you. Thanks for your input. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramona-quilter Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 Carole, You want a challenge....try diagonal lines using rulers. Before I go on, you need to understand that anything like that, besides being tedious, is going to be a lot of work. Work that is definitely worth more than any panto-rate. Do you have a base expander ? A stable platform for your ruler is a must for ruler work. But if it was me.... Well, if it was me, I would talk the customer out of diagonal lines or price it for her and let her decide. Can you say CUSTOM? Now, if I had a customer that really wanted diagonal, I think that I would ditch the idea of using rulers. Yikes! I think that I would engineer a way to mount the quilt diagonally so that the range of movement would be east-west on your machine. In other words, mount the quilt and use those whiz-bang channel locks to go back and forth (that is left to right) on that diagonally mounted quilt. That way, you could stitch the full length of the bed for several lines and then roll and do it again and again. It would definitely be beautiful but liike I said, a lot of work. I have only been doing this for a year. There is a log to experience and talent on this site. What say you, experts??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ferret Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 I was hoping to find the magi secret here I have tried diagonal lines exactly twice, both on small pieces and both were really hard to do. I assumed I just needed more practice with rulers. I love the idea of mounting the quilt diagonally. Ferret Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FowlManorQuilting Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 I'm working on a diagnally quilted piece right now. It is a signature quilt for our Motorsports minister. I'm doing it on my DS and am using blue tape to mark the lines. It comes off easily as I go and keeps my lines running right. I can see where this may be more difficult with a LA machine but perhaps doing portions of it at a time would work. Leave enough thread to tie off where needed. It is allot of work but the outcome is satisfying and it doesn't detract from the pattern at all. Having the quilt basted is essential so there is no shifting. Hope this helps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calaquilts Posted November 14, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 Thank You Linda. I will try the diagonal mount. I did try to talk the customer out of it and told her the price would be considerably more. She said no problem, she has her heart set on diagonals. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dfjett Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 Finally, something I can answer! I've done diagonal lines by mounting the quilt on point. What I did (with the help of my highly intelligent and highly educated husband; you need to remember I am severely mathmatically challenged!) is make setting triangles so I would have something to sew to the zippers (I use zippered leaders). I quilted all the way across and as far down as the set up would allow me. The next time I will do things a bit differently, though. If the quilt has borders, I will mount it on the frame as usual and quilt the borders to stabilize the quilt and any other area not to be crosshatched. Then, I will take the quilt off the frame and pin it on point, do all the quilting across. Take it off again, turn it and quilt the other lines. This is the only time I would pin a quilt to the leaders. The idea of bending over and sticking myself with pins is rather unappealing. The reasoning is it took a great deal of time to calculate setting triangles and sew them correctly to my zippers. Second, turning the quilt twice saves all those starts and stops. In the end, I believe I will save more time (and have less headaches) and produce a superior product. In this case I am only pinning a small area of the quilt to the leaders, so I can 'deal' with it. Of course, now I have no quilts requiring crosshatching, so I am thinking about doing one just for that purpose to satisfy myself that this approach is better than what I first did. There's just no way I would crosshatch an entire quilt with a ruler unless it was teeny-tiny! Lazy, lazy Deborah in NJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kerri Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 I'm going to do some diagonal crosshatching on a customer quilt which I'm starting today, yikes, after saying no way before. I got Tracy B of Constantinequilts.com's 14" triangle ruler. The size and weight of it keeps it very stable. In testing, it worked very well. You line up your square edge and run the stitch down the diagonal, and move over to your next mark or seam. Her rulers are called no frills rulers and templates. I got it at Kmquiltingsupply, and the nice thing is it didn't cost an arm and a leg, I think $16. I'll let you know if I get frustrated or it works when I'm finished. I really do not like rulers or templates, but I found I just want a straight and/or a diagonal line sometimes, so I'm trying again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evelyn Dobbins Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 I crosshatched a queen sized quilt using the Hartly fence. It turned out great. I don't use rulers much. I have a hard time with them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quiltmonkey Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 Like Evelyn, I was thinking that the Hartley fence would work well for doing diagonal lines. I plan on gettyng Myrna Ficken's book so I can learn how to do it! Shana Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Linda S Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 The absolutely easiest way to do diagonal lines is with the Circle Lord Crosshatch template! Especially if you are talking about doing a King sized quilt. Time is money, as they say. Linda Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramona-quilter Posted November 14, 2006 Report Share Posted November 14, 2006 I agree with Linda S. The CL is the best. And it would be absolutely straight provided you lined it up correctly after you roll it. I love my new CL. But the number of stops and starts for an entire quilt would make me look for other alternatives. Deborah Jett, How about a picture of that setup of yours with the setting triangle sewn to the zipper? That sounds like it might work. And then you could do several edge to edge lines before having to roll the quilt. Show us your stuff or have your DH patent this idea:D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calaquilts Posted November 15, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 Wow, this forum is awesome! I now have a few ideas to try out. Thank you so much! I have ordered the 14" triangle ruler and have been thinking of the circle lord. Guess I'll load a practice quilt and try a few different ways of doing the diagonals. Thanks for all your help. This is my first posting and sure won't be my last. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
annlittle1 Posted November 15, 2006 Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 Amazing, I wrote on this last week. Seems like when one of us has a problem, there is a number of others who have the same problem. I spent three days trying to do crosshatching on a 10 inch border using rulers, 45 degree triangles and a protractor. Picked it out three times. No matter how careful I was the lines shifted. I ordered the crosshatching template from CL. It arrived today so I will set it up tomorrow morning and get started on the crosshatching and the design work. I've already stabilized everything. I'll let you know how it works. EZ quilts has a similar template that isn't as costly as CL. I haven't tried any of their products yet, although I did purchase their Baptist Fan template. Since I already have the CL I decided to stick with their product this time because I don't have the time to learn a new system right now. I really need to try the Baptist Fan template that I bought from EZQuilts, but I just haven't had time to play with it. Phyllis Hughes Oklahoma City Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myrna Ficken Posted November 15, 2006 Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 I would use the Hartley Fence to do the diagonal line work. It makes it fast and easy. It do the entire quilt would be a lot of work with just a ruler. But it could be done. Myrna Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dfjett Posted November 15, 2006 Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 Linda: I cannot provide a pic. However, when my husband comes home, I'll ask him about the 'formula' he used to come up with the size of the triangles. They were quite large and I sewed together several pieces of leftover fabric to achieve pieces large enough for the triangles. I'm glad I have him to do the math! And, I am glad there are several ways to attack quilts like this. Crosshatching is so pretty and so commonly used, I think it's important to have many alternatives to use based on the needs of the particular quilt. Deborah in NJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sewbobby Posted November 15, 2006 Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 Just tried my Hartley Fence and did a small quilt with the diagonals, it was easy and looks beautiful :-). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evelyn Dobbins Posted November 15, 2006 Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 I'm not familiar with the Circle Lord and have a question. Can you adjust the width of your lines or is it set to one width only? The nice thing about the fence is you can make them any size you want. Thanks, Evelyn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
circlelord Posted November 15, 2006 Report Share Posted November 15, 2006 Hi, The Circle Lord diagonal is made with either a 12" or 18" template. The small template has 1/2 inch separation and the 18" has 1 inch separation. You can do 2" crosshatching by using every second line. If you want to do 3 inch or some other separation, you can use one groove and move the CL using the tape measure on the table. The CL uses a groove, which ease of control when moving up and down. When you wish to crosshatch you just lift the template and turn it 90 degrees and you will have perfect crosshatching. If you don't like starts and stops on the border, you can stitch in the ditch to the next line. This works best on busy patterned fabric. Cheers, Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spools Posted November 16, 2006 Report Share Posted November 16, 2006 Hi, I have a question? Is the Circle Lord something that can be used only on APQS machines? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
circlelord Posted November 16, 2006 Report Share Posted November 16, 2006 Carole The Circle Lord is made for A1, APQS, Gammill, HQ16, Kenquilt, Nolting , Prodigy, Proto, and many variations of the above brands. There is a separate 25 page manual for each model as well as a 40 minute video CD. The Webshot albums have over 500 pictures of Circle Lord quilts or template designs, and the Loricles website gives more details. The Circle Lord News Blog keeps you up to date on new products and quilt projects by CL owners. We have personal customer service available 15 hours a day, 7 days a week. http://www.circlelord.blogspot.com/ Cheers, Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
circlelord Posted November 16, 2006 Report Share Posted November 16, 2006 Sorry, Spools. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evelyn Dobbins Posted November 16, 2006 Report Share Posted November 16, 2006 Thank you, Michael for the info. I appreciate it. I think I'll take a closer look at CL. Thanks again, Evelyn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quiltinghereandthere Posted April 3, 2017 Report Share Posted April 3, 2017 Has anyone had to do crosshatching on 60 degree ? The quilt owner has made the Tessellation quilt patten by Alison Glass with 10" borders and wants variable sized diamonds just like on the sample........ Considering mounting on angle but would like feedback. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Primitive1 Posted April 4, 2017 Report Share Posted April 4, 2017 Good ideas above, I have used Linda Rech's rulers to do both crosshatching and diagonal lines and they worked great... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimerickson Posted April 4, 2017 Report Share Posted April 4, 2017 I recently watched a Sharon Schambler (spelling is probably wrong, the Prodigy girl at any rate) video where she was back filling a quilt. She referred to it as "stippling", where she did diagonal lines free hand. I was quite surprised, but after watching the video, tried it, and it worked pretty well. A little practice would probably make it a lot better. Now the areas she was working on were relatively small, and the diagonals were closely spaced, so it might not suit your needs. Check the video out and see if what she does might suit your needs. Jim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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