So, yeah, made my first underquilt...if you did not see it I can post some photos. At the end of it I am very happy, but I did learn several things, that frankly I already "knew", but just for some cognitive issue otherwise unspecified, I just did not apply. Call it poor planning. At one point as I worked on this or was planning, I began to ask this question, but kinda got "hung up" and sorta just "gave up" and paved forward.
I think a sort of vague optimism kept me going despite what I almost KNEW would happen, but I kept on going.
Anyway, I DIY'ed a sort of wooki copy..except wanted just a large like incubator sized shape as the quilt on the "underquilt hammock" (that is what I am gonna refer to it from here on out, that is the inner layer of the quilt that is a sort of "hammock" that the baffles and outer layer sew onto).
In doing so, I figured my width of the fabric and spacing of baffles using catsplat calculator, but I did notice that the calculator did not (or I didn't notice a function) give you a differential cut for the length of the quilt, only the width.
It also really did not take into account the loft I would want to preserve around the edges of the perimeter of the quilt, and I had to ad hoc fix that issue (which would have been the same result anyway if I had recognized it ahead of time, more on that later perhaps).
I just did my differential cut for the width, and ignored the length. Just typing that out right there is painful for me...why did I do that. Moving on...
So in the end, laying flat on the ground, it looked great...
Then when hung, it was "fine" but for except along the lowest portion where it bends, it compressed from like 3+ inches of loft to like maybe 1 inch, maybe less, depending on how tight I adjusted the thing..which I wanted to be able to torque it down all the same as the wooki (I used the exact same way of suspending my copy). If I let out some of that tension, the loft improved slightly, but not by much...and considering I stuffed it with 15 oz of 850fp hydrophobic treated down, it really was bugging me.
So...for like 3-4 days, I just said "well ill leave it, in reality my wife if/when she uses it will be in mild temps and it is very warm as it is), but that really was not pleasing me.
So, I decided, Ill fix it, or re-build it, harvest the down and re-stuff...
But before I did that, I figured I would attempt a post hoc differential.
I sewed (for now) 3 sort of pleats right across the full length of the inner layer of the quilt (that is the UQ "hammock" portion)...that shortened my inner length of the UQ relative to the outer layer and that WORKED. Of course, it weakens the "hammock" portion under stress, but I did some intial testing on scrap and feel pretty "ok" about it...not too worried, even if with more testing I have issues, I will still re-do the build, take like a 50 dollar loss (don't ask the time loss, not important).
BUT, I may soon enough build another one that is for me, that one was for my wife.
SO.....I kinda have scratched my head about how to do this lengthwise differential cut.
In my mind it looks like this, but I thought I would reach out to DIY'ers and get feed back.
If my desired end result is 75 inches long, then I need 8 inches of differential, then I need 75+8+inches of desired loft (3 for me)= 86 inches. so the inner quilt surface, the end result output is 75 inches, drawn out that way...the baffles will need to be cut as 86 inches long (probably a couple inches longer for good measure)...then I would sew that baffle material to each 75 inch run on the inner material (the "hammock" portion), and this would require like a series of pleats along that sewn line. probably would just use some wonder clips on these ahead of time to create a series of small folds where extra material would be more desired (at where the feet would lay (heels, butt, and lower back area))....then you sew the longer outer quilt material continuously to attach it to top. when sewing the perimeter, pleats will be used at those areas of most concern, but im not sure really it matters exactly where the pleats go.
I had to do the little pleats (assuming that is what you call it, when you kinda overlap some fabric and sew over it) for the head and foot end perimeter points of attachement as I DID do a differential lengthwise...same thing will happen on this 2nd attempt along the long edges.
Things I am foggy on still though...how much exactly do I need to preserve the loft? I feel "reasonably confident" about "approximately" I would need based on fiddling with my pleats on this build...my loft for this next build will be a similar goal.
So, basically, any wisdom from yall would be a help!
PS - I already said it, but despite my failures, I was able to (so far seemingly) make this last build work...it now lofts up to near max! Very pleased. Still need to test in cold weather...no stinking cold weather in sight at the moment.
Thanks ahead of time...man that was long.
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Originally Posted by Otter1
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