I am wanting to try FMQ now that I have a walking foot. I don't know where my instruction manual is for my machine. I am making a wild guess here but is the feed dog the little teeth looking thing that comes up thru the plate, if it is then how do I drop them so that I can FMQ. This probably sounds real stupid but would someone tell me if I am right and how to drop them. I have had this amchine for a couple of years and I am still learning things about it. It is a brother LS-30 if that helps.

I just did a search on your machine and you can download a manual for yours on this link

http://www.retrevo.com/support/Broth...9095bh746/t/2/

I have a brother NS30 and I can raise and lower my feed dogs with a switch at the back of the machine, just behind the needle. It has a picture of triangles with a line above and triangles with a line through them. Maybe your machine is similar. Hope this helps.

Thank you so craftybear. everytime I do a search I can't find anything. You really are crafty.

Nope I just looked and there isn't any switch, but I think I just figure out how to open this thing and properly clean it out. Thank You anyway.

Yep, that is what your feed dogs are :D:D:D
The manual should tell you whether or not yours can be dropped or covered :wink:

Hey cjo,

yep, the feed dogs are the teeth and when you do free-motion quilting (or darning) using the FMQ or darning foot, those teeth need to not get in the way. On some machines, they can be dropped below and on some there is a cover plate to simply cover them. Last night at my class, the teacher said that even one of those thick paper inserts from magazines can be used to cover feed dogs. (just tape it to the bed)

Now when you use the walking foot, the dogs need to stay up because you want to transport all the layers at the same time. So for any straight-line or grid quilting, the dogs stay in place. Hope this helps.

Thank you madquilter. I have done SITD but I am ready to try something new. I have several quilt tops that I want some mind of quilting done on them when I get them sandwiched. I don't do hand quilting or I should say I don't have the patience for it.

In some machines, there is a lever inside the bobbin area that you can move to drop the feed dogs. It may be marked with little "teeth" on it.

Did you pull off the flatbed? My Brother machine drops the dogs with a switch behind the needle, but you have to pull off the flatbed table to get to it.