This is what I'm going to use one of my small, vintage hand crank chain stitch machines for. It's very portable so I can move it instead of the quilt.
I basted the leader to a quilt once - and decided it was too much of a drag taking it apart, pinning and unpinning was less work.
I don't intend to use zippers though, I have an assortment of leaders to use. I'll report later on how it works out. My leaders are velcro'd to the bar, so no reason to use a zipper too, the velcro serves the same purpose.
I'm working on this mostly because my husband also likes to run the machine, and he's missing the end of one thumb so pinning is difficult for him.