QuiltNama

Profannie,
I have an HQ and love, love, love her. Had mine for about 5 years and done a ton of quilts for me and for others. I can take my time and do what I want on them as I am not using the machines in my quilt shop. There are many videos online for loading (I have red snappers, now) as that seemed to take me forever to learn how to do. I started with simple meander patterns and added a few new things every time I got what I was working on down and felt comfortable doing it. Now the sky is the limit, can do almost anything that comes to mind now. Love the fact that you do not have to layer the quilt before loading on the machine, it does the hard work for you. Enjoy your new baby.
Brenda

profannie

So happy to hear that, Brenda. I expect there will be a learning curve, but I'm still new to quilting, so I was thinking it was the right moment to do the move. People says good things about their HQ 16 and the model seems to have stay quite the same over the years, so it made meconfident to buy an older machine. Couln't afford a 4-5000$ one...

liking quilting

Sounds like you got a great buy. Let us know how you like it after you've put a few "miles" on it!

mamagrande

I bought a HQ16 last year, DH and I traveled 200 miles with pick up and trailer (trailer had a mishap on the way, fixed it) we packed "Harriet" up and brought her home...I have quilted a few queen size and several lap quilts on it. Harriet does not like all threads but I have found that this lady likes Aurifil thread and she just sings as she works. I paid $4,500 it does have a stitch regulator but it is very noisy and because I usually quilt at night I do not use it and find that I have become quite comfortable working without it. ....I had worked on a Nolting when I worked at a quilt store.

GEMRM

I'm sure you'll love the machine and quilting on the frame is so much nicer (my opinion of course!).
Enjoy!!!!!

profannie

Good to know. Fortunately, my new sewing room is in the basement where I could work at any hour without bothering anyone. I will keep in mind the question of the thread preference. I love Aurifil and got quite a lot of spools at a very good price, but I also use the Essential from Connecting Treads quite often (my Juki just doesn't mind at all).

profannie

Wow! This is same set up I bought (with a few less accessories) and the machine is also 10 years old, but the seller is asking 6000$ for it.
http://albany.craigslist.org/hsh/4582536367.html
So either I got the deal of the century, either her price is off...
Anyway, I'm happy!

nannyrick

Congratulations on your new addition!!! I,m sure you are going to love it.

solstice3

Congrats and hope you have years of enjoyment

radarxa

You are going to love it! I learned to longarm on the same setup. It is a wonderful machine that is simple and fun to use. Hooray for you!