I wind a whole bunch of bobbins at a time so that I don't have to stop and wind. My machine does have a separate winder so I don't have to unthread the machine to wind. One thing I did notice, however, it when I did not use the bobbin winder correctly, my tension was too loose winding it, it held a lot less thread. I am more careful to make sure that I have some tension on the thread and it will wind a lot more on the bobbin. I hope that I am making sense.