It's possible I might have found the FMQ "fairy dust" on the Internet. Read somewhere out there that you don't have to put the feed dogs down. I couldn't see how you could really free motion quilt with those teeth still sticking up but, having tried everything else, next day I put the darning foot on the Designer SE Husqvana, dialled up the straight quilting stitch (which seems to put most settings at zero) left those feed dogs right where they were and away it went. Maybe with the feed dogs in place the lower tension is still in the control of the sewing machine, not the sewer, which was always my big problem. And it's alcohol-free. Might be worth a try. If it doesn't seem to be right, add alochol.