Longarm straight line quilting information
 

I am in search of information about different forms of straight line quilting for longarm quilting. I have been searching online, but the majority of what I find is geared toward walking feet which does not help me. If you can point me in the right direction I would appreciate it. On-line info, books, a dvd, anything that is really beneficial to​ learning would be appreciated.:D

I am talking about quilting straight lines only, usually using rulers. It is often called ruler work. It can also be combined with free motion, but I am interested in the straight line ruler work.:)

Craftsy has a class taught by Kimmy Brunner called Machine Quilting with Templates. She uses more than straight line, but you could probably get a lot of the information you want from that class.

When you use a template for ruler work, you need to make sure you have your wider ruler base on and you are using a long arm template, not a rotary cutting template or ruler. The template needs to be held half a foot width away from the line you want to quilt. THis does take practice. Put the needle down in the place where you want to start your stitching, slide the ruler up to the foot, and make it parallel to the line you want to stitch, then go slowly. For SITD, I find a shorter guide, like about 6" works best because to follow a stitch line you will need to keep adjusting.
What kind of machine do you have? Some machines have wheel locks that you can use to stitch in straight horizontal and vertical lines, but you can use small clamps if your manufacturer doesn't make them. Very quick, but if you haven't loaded the quilt perfectly straight or the piecing is off, the quilting lines may not match up.

I love ruler work - I have a huge assortment of rulers for my HQ (right now, HQ does not offer one I don't already have).

Since I have the prostitcher on my machine, I can also use that for straight line quilting, and I can lock horizontal or vertical direction too.

This quilt was done with ruler work for all the straight work, and the computer for the fancy stuff in the blocks

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...psfkyt5fyi.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...psqq3lu4mo.jpg

I did have one class on ruler work, and mostly it was about how to hold the ruler and move your hands with it so it didn't pop up on you. there is a lot of moving your hands around with ruler work as you do need to make sure it's staying down were the foot it. I do have a ruler base, but things still came move around alot.

Macybaby: beautiful work. I am writing your name down for when I start ruler work. Your work is amazing!

I asked my quilter to order these pantographs for the three (double sided) quilts she is currently doing for me. I've never been a fan of meandering styles and do my own smaller quilts doing straight(ish) lines or circles. I don't use ruler work on my own :) and couldn't afford to pay someone else to do it

Another way to do straight line quilting is with channel locks. Not sure if HQ offers such a product. Channel locks are normally used when doing straight lines E2E, they also come in handy for basting.

I love ruler work. The first time I tried it though, I found it awkward and unwieldy, but I kept practicing and using them and it didn't take long before I felt quite comfortable with just about any template. Like all things quilting, it just takes patience and practice. I use rulers for all my SID and I even used rulers to help guide the LA when ditching applique. But then you have to constantly manipulate the ruler and go slowly.

You still need to do a certain degree of marking with rulers, like registration points to line things up.