Well, the saga continued all day yesterday while I went through every possible needle-thread-tension combo. I even kept a chart of my results. Still the with same thread shred & break results, so frustrating. I gave up and thought I would give my old Viking Rose a shot at it. She performed beautifully with a topstich needle 90/14 and Gutterman 100% poly. Still, I was miffed (and slightly heart broken) at my Baby Lock Quilters Pro that I just purchased used in the fall was not up to this seemingly simple task. I bought it specifically for FMQ and thought I may have made a huge mistake. My husband suggested typing in the name of the machine along with the problem and voila...this post popped up:
https://www.quiltinaday.com/communit...=10899&forum=7. Same machine, same problem she was quilting with a flannel back, mine with fleece. As the post suggests, try a 90/14 embroidery needle as they are tempered to resist bending and the eye is very smooth. So off to another trip to Joanns (50% coupon in hand) for embroidery needles. Back home I decided to rip out some FMQ stitches on (that darn) quilt so I could accurately assess if the new needles were working on the same quilt. FINALLY, SUCCESS!
So the right combination for me on this machine (Baby Lock Quilters Pro) was a Schemtz Embroidery needle 90/14 with Gutterman 100% poly and tension set to about 3.75.
I hope this helps anyone else out there with a similar problem!
"The only way to kill disappointment is to keep trying" - Kim Robinson Stanley, The Shaman