Friday eve: After much practice, and I did say much, I decide to spread out into the next room,next to my sewing room. Set up my old Singer 15, now that I know the feed dogs drop:). A handy piece of information for sure! Now keep in mind, this would be my dh's den! So now I have the old singer and 2 large tables for support! My dh helped me set it up, and he said " You might as well have this room to as you already spilled over into it. I don't use it anyway". Bless him, what a sweetheart! I start my FMQ and moving right along and grrrrrr. thread breaks ***. Oh again, grrr****. Ok, put in next size up again, same thing, clean the machine, ck the tension,,,,,gggggrrrrrrrrr, again, what the Hey?Ck the thread, moving along, break break, grrrr. Ck everything, gee,running out of ideas, too bad it was going well though except this, oh wait a minute! Someone somewhere said to use a stretch needle!!! In the car, shoot across 20 miles of countryside to my LQS, now I am in store, chatting with a real nice clerk, I have come to known over the years. Then met some other nice people and had a very lovely conversation, knowing that I am on a time schedule, I had 6 women coming over Saturday to work on a quilt. My mind is on all the things I got to get ready for Saturday, clean up sr, house, can you imagine? and what am I going to serve for lunch, snacks, but what the heck! $35.00 later I left the store with my one pack of stretch needles and sale fabric I can' t pass up even though I perhaps should of, but it was a great sale! Anywhoo, now the needle is in the machine, purring right along and snap, the thread breaks again. What the heck! One more time, ok snap again! Again, grrrr! OK, well I think i got a pack of "quilting needle" Singer or not, I am trying it! Now I a am purring along and FMQing like their is no tomorrow! Wowsers! Gee, what a diffrence the right needle can make!

:thumbup:

I learned lesson the hard way also! That's the first thing I check if thread starts breaking. Rarely have that problem anymore!

Yeah!! :thumbup:

Yeah!! :thumbup:

That's too funny! Glad you got it figured out. A lot of times I have tried to get by with what I had, only to go through the constant Grrrrr*()(*()*. I was told I sounded like a disgruntled zoo ready to start a revolution.

Now, the first thing I do before starting FMQ is put in the correct needle; one made for quilting. The old needle can be stabbed into a bar of soap to save the tip. No, this does not clog up the eye. When you return to your utility sewing, you still have needles that are perfectly fine that can be used and the animals have been tamed.

Maybe that was my problem yesterday. I must have broken 3 or 4 needles.

Proper needles really make a difference. The right size needle for the thread you are using is a must for swear free sewing.

I learned the same last week...I was having so many problems with the thread breaking when I was FMQ'ing. I was at the dealer and mentioned it to him that my machine doesn't like my thread. He said its not the thread and He gave me a pack of number 14 quilt needles since I was using heavy backing...normally your could use size 11. When I started FMQ'ng...I was amazed...no more breaking!!!! The right tools make all the difference.

Figuring out the correct needle for every scenerio is the biggest challenge to many of us! Glad you found one that works well for your machine :D:D:D