i am starting looking at long arm machines i will beable to get one in june ni ngoing to get it for a birthday presant to me can any one suggest which one i should look most closely at

If you can get to a quilt show, many of the long arm manufacturers are there. Be sure to try them all. Each one has its own feel. Make sure you have a clear vision of your quilting area and nothing is obstructing your view. Get a good feel for the handle bars, you will be spending alot of time attached to them. One very important consideration is if there is local service in your area, in case you should need it. If you have any questions, pm me and I will be glad to answer for you.

I got an email today, where you can finance those machines. I thought to myself...Must be one heck of a machine that it has to be financed. So I clicked on the link and "browsed" then I picked myself up off the floor and told my husband, " that machine cost 16k". But I did find a bargain one, 6500 dollars.

So if the repo man shows up for the long-arm machine, does one throw fat quarters at him?

I can tell you I love my mid arm, the HandiQuilter 16. They have great customer service, and also offer the Fusion 24 inches and the Avante 18 inches. Once I am employeed again I am hoping to trade in for the Avente, I do not have the room for the Fusion:(

http://www.quiltingboard.com/t-18356-1.htm

this isn't all there is by any means, but it'll give you some insight into the tin lizzie. it's hard to tell someone else what machines are good. they're all over the place in price. the tin lizzie is among the lowest in price.

Help! I have the Queen Quilter 18, which is fairly new to me. I'm having trouble with the stitch regulator. Must be doing something wrong. I get big stitches when going over seams and changing directions - or going backwards. I think it should work better. Something I should be checking for?

I have an original Grace Machine Quilter frame with a Juki TL98Q on it. Yahoo has a group for people with Grace frames and I see a lot advertised there for sale. The Grace company will also send you a cd and catalogs if you call them.

1. don't assume you're doing anything wrong.
2. after reading the manual/instructions carefully, call tech support. they
should walk you through this with no trouble.
3. look for a yahoo.group or other blog website for this machine. i found a
simple answer to a wire thing that was driving me nuts. i asked and some
person actually posted pics of the solution.

i don't know about yours, but on the tl18, there's a wire under the trolley/carriage that corresponds to left - right, back-forth. one wire each function. check the manual to find where yours are. make sure they're making good contact. if that's the problem, it's an easy fix. also, check the needle. if it's blunt, it'll skip like that.

You might want to join the homequiltingsystems group at http://groups.yahoo.com to research machines and setups. This is a very active group of machine quilters with different combos.