Originally Posted by wannaquilt1
so you are free motion quilting at an 8? what happens when you don't get tension? does it catch on the bottom?
Yup. FMQ at an 8 with two different threads in top and bobbin and my Janome isn't vomiting thread! Not catching, just nice beautiful stitches. The 'test' I did yesterday was pebbling and your going to have tension problems I would think you'd notice it then. I also did some straight stitches.
Bear in mind though, 8 is what worked for my machine speed, my hand speed and my sandwich. My sandwich test is very strange as I had to come close to duplicating my landscape quilt.
I took 1 piece of scrap 12" x 6" and folded it in half. In the middle I layered several scraps of batiks - some overlapping just like they overlap in my quilt top. Then I have 1 layer of flannel (my chosen "batting"), and 1 more layer of fabric (backing). So I'm quilting through a LOT of "stuff"!!! Which just means ...keep playing.