Needle Sizes

Okay. We're just talking about basic piecing, right? Nothing with contrary metallic or skitery skooting slippery/slidey stuff? I love the plain old Schmetz green-band size 70. They do just fine with Bernina almost all the time on anything. *New* I think is the important word. You give your sewing, your machine and yourself the best possible adventure by changing needles to a fine new one quite often. Every six years is Not okay. Polly

I never use Universals with quilting cottons. I am partial to topstitching needles for most piecing and quilting- sizes 12 for piecing and 14 for MQ'ing. I use metallica needles for metallic threads and I have sizes 16 and 18 and 20 for heavy duty stuff- like the moon over the mountain quilt. I quilted it in sections and when I joined two sections I had four layers of stout Kona cotton plus two layer of W&N- then the thickness of the seams

*plus* the 'flap' stitched over the seam allowance. The was quite a job piercing all those layers! Then I have double needles and quilting needles and a slew of other ones in many sizes. I even have some size 8 for machine applique with invisible thread- it makes tiny holes for that very fine thread.

Leslie & The Furbabies in MO.

What is your favorite needle size for basic piecing?

I use sharps -- but have never paid much attention to size. Decided maybe I need to learn a little about needles. I understand the numbers (thanks to this:

-- and I seem to mostly have 12/80.

So what do you use? Sharp? Universal? and what size do you find works best?

So much of this has to do with your own SM. There's a Viking sitting right here beside me ( I wish!) that belongs to a friend. This particular Viking much prefers a size 80 needle. I don't even know how to turn that one on but I do know that a size 80 is preferred. Polly

On Mon, 20 Dec 2010 21:07:09 -0600, Kate in MI wrote (in article ):

For piecing, I almost always use and 80/12 Universal.

Maureen

My sewing machine dealer tells about the customer who brought her machine in for servicing because it wouldn't sew. She had NEVER EVER changed the needle in the machine - which she had owned for several years. I don't know how you could sew for several years without manageing to break the needle a time or two or three. Anyway, the needle was so worn down that it would no longer catch the bobbin thread!

Donna in Idaho

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On Tue, 21 Dec 2010 21:52:18 -0600, Donna in Idaho wrote (in article ):

I went with my friend yesterday to pick up her machine which was being fixed. Sitting right next to it was another machine which was brought in because is wouldn't sew. The repair guy said the needle was so old it had worn into a u-shape.

After I got done cringing, I wondered how that lady didn't notice that something was wrong with the needle and change it!

Maureen

Nobody taught her any different I guess. The machine probably needed cleaned up and serviced anyway if she was that clueless. So many older machines I've seen in thrift stores and yard sales have the feed dogs just packed with lint and I wonder if that is why someone stopped using it. You know the tension is wacky when it is like that. Also needles in backwards is common in machines folks think are dead. Some folks just don't bother to learn about their machines or basic sewing. Taria

It's because our mothers and grandmothers bought their needles in three packs and they didn't change them until they broke.

She obviously didn't break that one. I was doing the same thing until I came on to this list. I only changed my needle when it broke, just like my Mum! Now I change it when it starts 'thumping'! Or, when I need a 'jeans', hemstitch or metallic needle.

Do you think those old 'three pack' of Singer needles were tougher than the ones we now use? They bought them at Murphy's 5 & 10 cent store, they're all gone now. I only use Schmetz because that is what my machine likes.

Bonnie, in Middletown, VA, it's still cold here!

I took a class at my LQS around 7 years ago. The elderly lady next to me was sewing on a Janome 10000 machine that she had purchased a while before that. All of a sudden her machine froze up and refused to sew and she ended up having it repaired. It turned out that she had never cleaned lint out of her machine and it was so tightly packed down in there that it just stopped sewing. Janome tightens the screws down so tightly on new or factory fixed machines, that she thought she was not supposed to look down in there. My DH had difficulties loosening the screws on my Janome.

Bev > Nobody taught her any different I guess. The machine probably needed

Chap rings me up one day..

"Hello, my wife has broken her sewing machine, I wonder if you can help?"

Me: "What has happened?"

Man: "She's had it about 5 years, and she's broken the needle. Do you know if they can be replaced?"

Me: (desperately trying not to laugh) "Have you looked in the tool box? There will be 5 more in a little packet, and instructions on how to put a new one in in the little book..."

Man: "Oh, thank goodness, she uses it ever such a lot and she's ever so upset"

Me: Ring me back if you can't sort it out (Puts phone down and explodes lightly...)

Ddin't get back to me... I wonder if he ever puts oil in his car?

HH