Originally Posted by rinchan314

Beginner here. I'm working on my first queen-size quilt, using a bunch of different shades and patterns of blue. I figured it would be easiest to use invisible thread so I don't take away from how nice all the colors already look together.

​​​​But this stuff is giving me fits!

First I tried Dritz "quilting thrrad"." It was nylon, .004. It was constantly breaking and tangling. I could barely touch it without a bunch of thread popping off the spool and tangling. All the extra thread would wrap around the machine, get stuck somewhere, and snap. Finally it got so tangled I couldn't use it anymore, so I threw it away and bought something new.

Now I'm using Sulky brand polyester, .004. This is the stuff my quilting book recommends. It is marginally better than the Dritz, but still driving me crazy. It's so fine. I guess that's good in terms of invisibility, but it's like my machine can't hang on to it. Half the time I start stitching to find it's pulled itself out of the needle on the first stitch, even if I hang onto it. It also doesn't like to feed itself. No matter which way I set the thread, it has a hard time pulling it off the spool. It's also driving my tension crazy. I've played with tension every which way and the only thing I can do to keep the tension balanced is to manually unwind the spool with my hand every few stitches. Otherwise it'll either start pulling the bobbin thread up top or it'll just stop feeding thread. I have tried using this thread in the bobbin but it will not wind, so I am using white cotton thread on the bottom.

I know there's got to be a way to do this, or people wouldn't use this thread in the first place. What am I missing? What's the trick?