OK, I've been tempted to make a karo step quilt after looking at all the posts of other's quilts that look so nice. I've also been renewing my efforts to lighten my pack and the new "seven D" fabric from TiGoat has had me salivating.
Here are the specs.
Total weight: 10.0 oz
Length: 68.5" at the edge, 79" along the center
Width: 40.5"
Thickness: 1.60" average
Baffle height: 1"
Baffle length: 6.5"
Box size: 10.25" long by 10.5" wide
Materials:
Fabric: Seven D at 0.63 oz/sy from www.tigoat.com
Down: 6 ounces of 800FP from www.hammockgear.com
Baffles: polyester tulle at 0.3 oz/sy from JoAnn's Fabrics
Thread: Gutterman Sew-all 100% polyester
If there is one mistake that I learned while making my first karo step quilt was that I did not leave enough room between the baffles, only 4". By this, I mean the gap between the squares. This came back to bite me in a couple of ways.
First, this small gap limited my ability to maneuver the fabric to sew the baffles to the 2nd side of the fabric, at least for the baffles running in the head to toe direction. When sewing these baffles the fabric has to be rotated 180 degrees and 4" of slack was barely adequate and made the sewing difficult.
Second, the small gap between the baffles limited my ability to hand stuff the down into the chambers. Admittedly, I have very large hands. But, I put way more stress on these tulle baffles than I would have liked while trying to get my fist full of down into the chambers.
Therefore, I would recommend a 6" gap between the baffles.
I have made a few "regular" down quilts and all in all, I did not find the karo step method any easier than the normal baffled quilts. For the 1" high baffles in this quilt, the karo step method is practical because a normal quilt would have lots and lots of baffles.
I think this will be my last karo step style quilt. But, it came out great in the end. Here are the pictures....
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