What tricks do you use when DIY'ing?

[IRONFISH45]

So many excellent ideas, I tried standing up, because my spine hurts to the point of tears when I sew sitting down, if I take pain junk I get too spaced to safely thread inject. I finally figured out to use my daughters desk at work, it is a bit taller than the average desk, it is BIG, her chair is very adjustable. I am now able to sit comfortably for about 2 hours, without pain meds. Works great for me. I know not to thread inject when I am tired, because negative things happen.

So many hints are very helpful, stabilizing my thread, Dutch's idea. My clothing and hair-do is where I stash things I am working with. Dutch has a better plan.

I use tape instead of a vice to hold large amounts of fabric from shifting where I do not want them to go. I also hang large amount of fabric over my shoulder to help it feed into the thread injector.

I have learned not to get my fingers close to the needle, I use a tool to get the fabric sorted out in tight places.

I clean my machine carefully when I am using fabrics with a coating, especially silnylon. I have found with the Argon I do not need to keep cleaning the needle and feed dogs.

I do not thread inject when I am tired or if I am not feeling a strong urge to thread inject. If I break that rule, I always make some sort of error that requires a lot of time to repair, or I ruin something.

[Aardvark]

Binder clips of various sizes to hold material, find them in Staples pretty cheap, cheaper at Dollar General.

Taped small magnet to Sewing Machine (around non-moving motor or mechanism area) to hold scissors or seam ripper, but realoly liking Dutch's tie organizer.

For quilts, rather than pinning baffles down, low tack masking tape to hold baffle, lay it out properly good sewing guide also.

[TPole]

Don't know if this is really a trick or not, but I find the more time I put into layout and marking the better my results are. I used to guess at hem widths, channels, etc. and the results were ok but not great. Now that I mark EVERYTHING I am much happier with how things end up.

[latriper]

Yep. I was the same way TPole. Now I try to spend the proper amount of time getting ready before I just hit the thread injector. I also try to have my workspace a little cleaner and more organized than I used to. Less headaches a long the way usually.

[latriper]

So many excellent ideas, I tried standing up, because my spine hurts to the point of tears when I sew sitting down, if I take pain junk I get too spaced to safely thread inject. I finally figured out to use my daughters desk at work, it is a bit taller than the average desk, it is BIG, her chair is very adjustable. I am now able to sit comfortably for about 2 hours, without pain meds. Works great for me. I know not to thread inject when I am tired, because negative things happen.

So many hints are very helpful, stabilizing my thread, Dutch's idea. My clothing and hair-do is where I stash things I am working with. Dutch has a better plan.

I use tape instead of a vice to hold large amounts of fabric from shifting where I do not want them to go. I also hang large amount of fabric over my shoulder to help it feed into the thread injector.

I have learned not to get my fingers close to the needle, I use a tool to get the fabric sorted out in tight places.

I clean my machine carefully when I am using fabrics with a coating, especially silnylon. I have found with the Argon I do not need to keep cleaning the needle and feed dogs.

I do not thread inject when I am tired or if I am not feeling a strong urge to thread inject. If I break that rule, I always make some sort of error that requires a lot of time to repair, or I ruin something.

I have never thought of standing but I may start! Waiting on the prior authorization to have some injections in the lower back. Worst kind of pain I ever want to go through.

[Just Bill]

I really hate making sleeping bags. Lining up the shells and baffles and trying to see my marks through black argon
I hate them a bit little less so now-
I built a "light table" I took an old window and set it on sawhorses so I could put a lamp under it. So lining up all my marks and putting pins in is much easier.

Even easier on a good day- I use my south facing patio door and blue painters tape to hang the shells up. I pin the top edges up top, let gravity keep everything straight, and work my way down the line putting pins in. For my machine/work bench- as long as I put in pins every six inches for the first 18" or so to get the stitch started I can go to 12-16" OC and fight the fabric much less than I used to.

[JWinNC]

Great tips.

[Osulagh]

I use masking tape to cut out my fabrics. First, I lay my fabrics on the floor (I've got hardwood) and tape the corners to keep it all taut. Then, I measure and mark where I need to cut on the edges and use masking tape to run a line across the fabric. I cut on the side of the tape with a good, sharp pair of scissors.

Yeah, it's a waste of tape, and yeah it's not the best way to cut. But it's what I do with the limitations I have and I get good, straight cuts all the time.

[latriper]

I use masking tape to cut out my fabrics. First, I lay my fabrics on the floor (I've got hardwood) and tape the corners to keep it all taut. Then, I measure and mark where I need to cut on the edges and use masking tape to run a line across the fabric. I cut on the side of the tape with a good, sharp pair of scissors.

Yeah, it's a waste of tape, and yeah it's not the best way to cut. But it's what I do with the limitations I have and I get good, straight cuts all the time.

I like that idea! I have been using the blue painters tape for a few things and really like how it doesn't leave a residue but yet it is fairly strong.

[xxl_hanger]

Here's the first version made out of an ancient dried up ink pen (it helped but the fit of the dowel is much better)...

Attachment 102713

My dried up pens fit exactly - into the spool and onto my spool pin like an adapter. The nicest solution I found is an empty "Faber-Castell Finepen 1511". This pen fits exactly into the mara spools. There is no way to make it better. I think I have about 10 of them - all are dried up.

Another nice solution is the cap of an old film shell. Most of these caps fit exactly below the smaller Tera spools and some fit also onto top-side of these spools. Though you get both. A tool which centers the spool on a thinner spool pin and/or a spool cap. It has almost the same diameter like a spool cap you can buy for your industrial sewing machine (35mm outer diameter and on the inner side of the cap there is another round notch with an 21mm inner diameter - almost the same than the outer diameter of the top side of a small Tera spool 20mm).