Could be a burr on your needle or elsewhere in the thread guides.

I have a Gammill.10 years old. The needle does not have a flat side like domestics do. If I get it in not completely centered it will shred and break the thread. The eye has to face completely center. To HELP I put a tiny speck of nail polish on my foot and line my needle up with that speck. It has to be exactly right or it will shred and break the thread.
I hope this works for you.

This is not true. The folks at Nolting will walk through everything with you. I bought a used one and they continue to answer and supply ideas. Try calling and be pleasant and ask specifics. They are a good bunch.

Thanks for the JW link. I've been struggling with Tension with my HQ after having it figured out with my Bailey - and he mentions winding them too tight. I had not thought about that - I wound the bobbins for my Bailey on my old Singer 15, but the HQ takes larger bobbins and comes with a winder. I've never used one before, and I'm sure I've got the tension set way too tight for it. I know that as I had to turn it up to 2 before it even had enough torque to overcome the tension.



I had by bobbin tension set correctly - but was finding I had to crank my top tension way down to get it to pull the bobbin thread up to the top - and then it seemed very sporadic.

Looking forward to going home and winding some bobbins and seeing if I can get my problem fixed.

I feel for you, I have had something like this problem and all it was is that I put the needle in backwards.........hope you can find this problem and FIX

Call nolting they will
Walk you through it they have great support very nice folks

Don't have a Nolting, but know that the manufacturer is a good one, so be sure to call. Are you using batik? I had a big batik quilt on my Gammill and kept shredding thread--had to REALLY loosen the quilt on the frame and it solved the problem. also have had some shredding in past when needle not totally centered. And have also had shredding when the thread slides off the cone too fast and then puddles around the cone holder and gets hung up(and if I don't notice that, when I re-thread it has often pulled the thread out of the intermediate tensioner)--that only seems to happen if I'm using something like Glide or Magnifico, etc. Just some things to check.

We first purchased a Nolting, used from a person in Kansas and we called Nolting and we talked to Dan Novak their technician. He talked us through repairs such as unscrewing face plate to untangle thread, taking some very fine sand paper to take a burr from the needle hole, running thread through batting (so it wouldn't tangle) and checking the timing after a needle was broken. When we needed to have it serviced we sent it to Iowa and we decided to upgrade they took ours as a trade in. So, I have nothing but good things to say about Dan and Nolting.
I know how frustrating thread breakage can be. We used Signature thread (it was particular about thread) and It does not like a quilt to be too tight as other have said.

I had the same problem with my HQ Avante......to the point I finally insisted he come to my house to see what I was doing wrong. He IMMEDIATELY saw what was wrong........the back bars had been set too high. If the bar is too high, the fabric goes up and down with each stitch and "saws" at the thread. Make sure your fabric isn't sitting too high. My biggest problem with the repairman was he didn't put the machine on the table.....he just put fabric up to it like he was sewing on a domestic sewing machine and kept saying it was working. Good luck......keep insisting they help you. If you have to, take it in and SHOW them. I hate when they ask what the problem is and then get it all wrong when relaying the problem to the repairman.!!!!!!

Used to have the Fun Quilter , its a great machine. May be your timing is a little off.