Batting Shrinkage
 

I am nearly finished with my current quilt top and hope to get it to the quilt shop tomorrow or Monday for machine quilting. They will put 80/20 generic thin generic batting in and I happen to know it will shrink some because the baby quilt I made here at home shrank when washed and dried in a dryer. I don't mind if this quilt (full/double bed size) shrinks very minimally but if at all possible I want to minimize that to very, very little. When the time comes to wash it, if I wash in cold water and air dry, will that help prevent shrinking? Other methods?

Cool wash and fluff dry will help minimize shrinkage but laundering is not the only part that affects shrinkage rate. Whether or not the fabrics were prewashed and the amount of quilting also plays into the shrinkage amount.

How the amount of quilting? How much to minimize?M

My fabrics are not preshrunk. I was using precut 2½" strips for most of the pieces.

I don't know how much an 80/20 batt will shrink. I also don't put my quilts in the dryer. They seem to end up in a big ball so I line dry them. I use Warm and white batts and I preshrink them by putting them in the washer in hot water and letting them soak. Then I just spin out the water and put them in the dryer. It will shrink before I quilt it but once it's quilted, I don't put quilts in the dryer.

Generally, the battings that I have used that are an 80/20 have shrunk about 3 percent.

A cold water wash minimizes the shrinking that takes place during washing. In my experience, the most shrinkage occurs when drying in a high temp dryer. So, your plan to wash in cold water and lay flat to air dry should cause very little shrinkage (maybe 1%). Hot water wash and regular dryer will cause about 3% shrinkage in an 80/20 batting.

When you lay out flat to dry, putting a fan or two on the quilt will speed drying as will turning the quilt over periodically. Once most of the water is out of the quilt, you can finish drying by hanging on a stairwell or the like (which allows air to both sides).

I would want a good quality batting in my quilts and also in my charity quilt. If it is a major brand, I wouldn't worry about shrinkage. I would cool wash and line dry or in the dryer with no heat.