Metallic Sewing Thread

how do i sew taffeta?

i’m trying to sew two pieces of green metallic stretchy taffeta and the threads are snagging, pulling, skipping, or not even sewing at all! i’m on a really vintage singer, so i don’t have zig zag! what do i do????

Go find a friend with a serger and beg???

You’ve chosen a fairly difficult to sew fabric, but it can be sewn very nicely on your machine. You’re going to need to experiment. Here are the issues you’re facing:
1) taffeta tends to do what’s called “seam slippage”, where the seams disintegrate under stress. Metallics do it too. When you get your first good seam in a scrap, try pulling it apart… you may need to switch to a different seam type or you may have to fuse the seamlnes with a very lightweight interfacing.

http://www.amefird.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/Minimizing-Seam-Slippage-2-12-10.pdf

2) stretch wovens tend to pucker, so you’ll need to figure out what’s going on and adjust the stitch length and tension for a good seam:

http://www.amefird.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Minimizing-Seam-Puckering-2-5-10.pdf

http://www.amefird.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Sewing-Stretch-Woven-Fabrics-2-5-10.pdf

3) compounding the whole problem is that I’ll bet your fabric is stretching as the needle pushes through it, then bouncing up like a kid on a trampoline. To fix that, put some tissue paper or adding machine tape or embroidery stabilizer on top of and underneath the fabric at the seamline. Sew through and then remove the paper or stabilizer.

4) and finally, the needle. Normally, I’d suggest about a size 10 sharp needle — jeans or microtex in Schmetz’s point system, but with metallics, you may find that a ballpoint needle works a bit better (universal, jersey or stretch in Schmetz-speak). And I’d try them in that order. If you’re still not getting good stitching, go to a size 12 — but I really doubt that will be needed.

Needles wear out with stitching… usually you get about 2-8 hours of needle up and down through fabric time before they’re dead. If you hear pop-pop-pop as you stitch or if you see the seam quality deteriorating or if the machine is just acting funny, stop and put in a new needle. Most of the time, that’s what’s needed. (And put in a new needle before you make buttonholes… they’ll go a *lot* better.)

Needle education: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AjECWVQXQxfIg1XVDdES157ty6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20100830194957AAbRmj7&show=7#profile-info-gHVJ22AKaa

Good luck!

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