Re :- Bloc Loc Rulers
 

I am in the UK and I shall be going to the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham (UK) in August. Bloc Loc will be there - and I wonder if these are worth investigating ? Any thoughts please.
Thank you.

Love my Bloc Loc rulers! I tend to do a lot with HST's and these work great. I cut my pieces a little bigger before sewing, then trim with Bloc Loc's. Perfect every time!

I have so many rulers that I initially thought this would be one I could live without. On advice from a friend I bought the 6.5 size. I LOVE IT! It's worth and price, and it is pricey.

I thought I would love my bloc locs. I got a carousel from Martelli and everything. I don't like them - don't know if I am using them wrong or what the story is.

Worth Every Penny! I tried lots of different methods to get perfect HSTs, with these rulers I do. I use mine with a turn table cutting mat.

At first I didn't like mine at all. I kept reading how others liked them so made a lot of HST and used the ruler until the Ah Ha moment kicked in. It is a must for me now.

I have the 3 pack of the HST bloc locs, have been using them for maybe 8 months and absolutely love them. You wont believe how quickly you will finish your squaring up process!! Really, really amazing.

To make it most efficient for me, I put my stack of HST to the left of where I am cutting (make sure your seam allowances are all pointing in the same direction in the stack) and trim up only one half of each HST, placing them to the right after trimming. Then, I take the stack and rotate it, set it on the left again, rotate the ruler as well and I am ready to trim the other half of the HST. This for me is much quicker and efficient than trying to spin around the HST under the ruler as they show in videos.

I also have several of the flying geese rulers and these are absolutely incredible as well. You will get perfectly cut-sized flying geese every time and the trimming is so easy. The down side is the limitation of size since the ruler has to be an exact size match to the flying geese. Right now I am shying away from a few of my patterns because they call for an odd shaped geese that i don't have a ruler for.

I recently purchased the bloc loc strip ruler. This one I am finding is not as helpful to me as I am generally making 4 patch or 9 patches with small squares. This means you are cutting small strips and I like to have the strip of fabric to my left and cut off the left edge so when cutting a 1 inch strip, there is only 1 inch of fabric under the ruler. This makes it more difficult to utilize the benefit of the channels in the ruler. I have developed a technique where I place the ruler over my strip, get the channels nestled into the seam allowances and cut from the right side. But I am not using the markings on the bloc loc ruler (example, if you have an 8 inch strip and you move the fabric edge to the 6.5 you know you are cutting a 1 1/2 strip) but rather I'm butting up to the right edge of the ruler with another small ruler (right now I am using my 3 1/2 inch square ruler because I am cutting 1 1/2 inch strips) to get a 1 1/2 strip. For some reason this is just easier for me. I was amazed at how quickly we can learn muscle and visual memory because after a few dozen times I am quite easily finding that 1 1/2 spot and moving the rulers in sync quite effortlessly. I imagine this ruler works quite easily as designed if cutting larger strips -say 3 inches or more since that provides more fabric under the ruler. So, this ruler is a maybe for now.

I prefer the Eleanor Burns Triangle Square Up Ruler for squaring HSTs, because you trim before you press open. That way, you only make 2 cuts, instead of 4.

Thank you so much for all your replies - I will certainly find the demo stand and have a look. From your answers - I will definitely get the 6 1/2" one. Great replies !!

Yes, DottyD, the 6 1/2 inch square HST ruler is the only size I use even though I bought the 3 pack. I just like having more room for my hand to hold down the ruler as I cut. I have used the ruler for well over 500 HST so far (about 300 2.5 inch ones and the rest 3.5 inches). It is the best.