File Fixes Avoid Poor Sewouts

When your design goes wrong, follow these efficient tips and tricks to get back on track.
April 1, 2009

By Pat Williams, Contributing Writer

After hours in front of the computer, and subsequently test sewing a new design, digitizers sometimes are frustrated when something that looks good on screen just won't sew out well on fabrics. There are a few tricky aspects of the digitizing process that create these types of elusive problems. Let's consider the most common issues so that you can recognize and fix potential problems while the design is still on your screen.

The Newport Plumbing design shown below is one such project. The original design (Figure 1) looked fine on the digitizing screen, but problems became evident during sewout. It had many thread breaks and thread pull-outs. The garment puckered and registration was poor — borders did not match up with outlines and material showed between the sails and the background. The lettering is of poor quality and there were excessive trims, which increased the running time.

Once we attack each of these issues, we can produce a file that sews beautifully (Figure 2).

Figure 1


A sewout of the original (above) which looked fine on screen. After digital file fixes (below), it sewed beautifully.

Figure 2


True thread breaks are caused by too many stitches packed into a small area or too short a stitch length. To correct these problems, decrease density and make sure all stitches are at least 1mm long.

Thread pull-outs — when thread comes out of the needle — often are viewed as thread breaks. In fact, pull-outs account for the majority of what people call thread breaks. However, they are not technically thread breaks, and are caused by too few tie-down stitches in the design. Thread pull-outs can occur when a new object or letter is started without sufficient tie-down stitches. It takes three to five stitches to tie the bobbin thread and top thread together before the machine starts filling an area with whatever stitch type you are using. So be sure you have your stitch parameters set to apply sufficient tie-down stitches, or enter them manually into your design after every trim.

The garment also puckered — the No. 1 problem with most designs — which can be caused by many factors.

The main reason for puckering in the sewout in Figure 1 is that the fill stitches in the white circle radiate out from the center. Radiating stitches in a design like this will push the bias of the fabric at 45 degrees and 135 degrees. At the same time, stitches at 0 degrees and 90 degrees will pull in on the fabric. The result of this push and pull is a wave in the fabric.

To fix these problems (Figure 3), begin by changing the fill stitch angle to just slightly off horizontal. All the stitches filling a circle should flow in one direction.

Figure 3


Too short a stitch length also can cause puckering in a design. In the original version of this design, the stitches in the white area only had a 2.5-mm stitch length. In the corrected version, the stitch length was increased to 4 mm.

At the same time, too much density also can create puckering during sewout — the trick is to be able to determine the correct density while looking at the file on the computer.

The poor sewout results in Figure 1 show what happens when fill density is too light; it allows the fabric to show through the garment. You have to increase density to fix this problem — but not too much, or there's potential for puckering. The solution is to add a cross-hatch underlay with stitch directions at 45 degrees and 135 degrees in relation to the direction of the top fill. The underlay stabilizes the garment and provides color coverage without having to use too much density in the top layer of fill stitches.

Registration issues also were evident in several locations in Figure 1. For example, the blue borders don't line up with the white fill. The registration is particularly poor in the sails. Note how the white fill in the center sail does not even cross the top of the white circle.

The problem is push and pull on the garment. Fill stitches push up at the top of the fill area, then push down at the bottom. They will pull in at the sides of the fill in the direction of the fill angle. Borders are most likely in the right place; it's the fill areas that have to be adjusted.

The shape of the fill has to be pushed down so that it appears to barely meet the border at the top and the bottom. It also has to be pulled out at the sides so that it appears to extend to the outside edges of the border. To solve the problems where the sails did not meet up with background, the shape of the background stitches needed to be extended behind the sails, as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4


Also, lettering problems can stem from several different factors in the digitized file. In this case, the angle of the fill behind the letters was vertical. This caused the columns of the satin stitches comprising the letters to separate those background stitches, allowing some of the garment fabric to show through.

In lettering or any other column, stitches should be an absolute minimum of 1 mm wide. A better width is 1.2 mm, if you can manage that. In this case, the blue lettering was just too small overall. It needed to be enlarged, as well as have wider columns.

There were trims between all of the letters, and the digitized file did not include tie-down stitches at those points, causing thread pull-outs. These letters also were so close together that the best solution was to remove the trims and apply tie-down stitches to the first stitches of each word. A center walk underlay, in a stitch length of 1.8 mm, was added to support the columns of the letters.

American Gold Star
The sewout of the American Gold Star design (Figure 5) caused severe fabric puckering, numerous thread pull-outs and excess trims. This design has fill stitches that radiate out. In this case, however, you can't solve this design's sewout problem by only adjusting the fill stitches.

Figure 5


The blue arrows in Figure 5 point to trapped negative spaces. When negative space is enclosed by stitches that push into it from various directions, the unfilled space will pooch up, making the sewout pucker. To correct this, the background was filled in with stitches (Figure 6).

Figure 6


If you need these areas to appear as though they are negative, but know they need to be filled in for the design to sew correctly, simply sew them in a color thread that matches the garment.

Correcting the angle of the fill stitches of the outside circle did more than just help prevent the puckering. When the stitches radiated out from the center, the direction of the stitches were at the same angle as the columns of the lettering on top. This made the columns of the letters separate the fill stitches, which allows garment fabric to show through. Converting the background fill stitches to sew in one direction provided a better base for the lettering (Figure 6).

The lettering in this design has trims between each letter and, like the Newport design, has a lot of pull-outs because the digitizing did not contain tie-down stitches at those points. The trims also made for too many knots on the back of the work and increased running time by 2.5 minutes. There is no reason to trim lettering that is this close together. Trim between words, but not between letters if the space between them is 1 mm or less.

Horseman
The Horseman is a simple design that you wouldn't think could cause many problems. But, the sewout presented a lot of puckering, poor coverage and exposed underlay. In Figure 7, you can see that the original stitch angle was at 45 degrees. This meant that every stitch in this design was pushing against the bias of the fabric. That's the most obvious problem, but the design also had other issues.

Figure 7


Note the start and stop points marked with the green arrows. Because the stitching started at the top of the horse's ear and ended at the base of the rider, the machine would start stitching at the ear, go down and stitch the tail, the legs and the back side of the horse, and then meet in the middle. As the fill stitches were sewing from both ends of the horse to meet in the middle, they were pushing the fabric in from two directions. This caused a little ridge of garment fabric in the center that was not covered by stitches.

Poor coverage in general was caused by the stitch lengths being too short — 3 mm — and a lack of sufficient underlay behind the fill.

To correct this design, use an edge walk and cross-hatch underlay, and adjust the stitch length to 4 mm and stitch angle to just slightly off horizontal. Move the start and stop points so that the fill runs in one direction from the bottom of the horse's back hoof up to the ear (Figure 8).

Figure 8


Other Factors
Backing that is too light for the design being sewn can contribute to sewout problems. Poly-mesh backed by a light tearaway is a great combination for knit shirts. However, when a design starts to exceed 8,000 stitches, this combination usually won't be strong enough to support the design. Cutaway backing of 2 ounces to 2.5 ounces will work better for high-stitch designs.

Multiple layers of cutaway will not solve puckering problems. If one layer of a good cutaway backing won't hold the design, don't just use a second layer of backing. Go back to the digitized file and look at density, stitch lengths, stitch angle and underlay directions to correct the design.

Improper hooping techniques also can cause puckering. Everyone knows that fabric should be taut in the hoop. Some operators, however, try to make their hoops so tight that as they push the upper ring of the hoop into the lower ring, they actually push excess fabric into the center of the hoop. So the hoop seems really tight, but the fabric is loose and will move around while being embroidered. Hooping this way also will cause unsightly hoop marks on the fabric.

On the other extreme, you also will have problems when over-stretching fabric to make it taut in the hoop. When the garment is released from the hoop, it will relax around the embroidery and the fabric will pucker.

Note that nylon and satin jackets will slip a little with each stitch that is applied to the garment. To minimize this slippage, wrap the inner hoop with a sticky sports wrap available at your local pharmacy or sporting goods store.

Finally, thread tension that's too tight also creates excess pull on the garment. That can make designs pucker, as well as throw off registration.

Learning to recognize these potential problem areas in your designs will help you make corrections while in the digitizing process and leave you with designs that will lie correctly on your garments without puckering, thread breaks or excess trims.

Pat Williams of Image Embroidery in Sierra Vista, Ariz., is an award-winning digitizer with experience in accounting and small business management. For more information or to comment on this article, e-mail Pat at Pwilliams22@cox.net or visit imageemb.com.

Tips for Training Embroidery Operators
Does your shop have a training program? Even if you are a one-person shop, there will likely come a day when you will need to train a helper, salesperson or machine operator. Start keeping notes now about what your employees need to know and how you want to teach them.
September 14, 2009

How Fabric Color Impacts Contract Digitizing
A common frustration for contract digitizers is when the sew-out of their file tests perfectly but turns out horrible on the customer's machine. The file is sent back and the digitizers are then trying to fix an already perfectly digitized file and can only guess where the problem may lie.
September 14, 2009

Off the Cuff: Selling to Religious Organizations: Part 1 of 2
In our industry we decorate a massive assortment of items by a broad variety of technologies. Then we distribute what we produce to virtually every economic sector in every nook and cranny of society.
September 14, 2009

Diversifying Your Customer Base  
Learn to evaluate and adjust your mix of clientele for optimum profitability and stability.
While the economic lows that many American markets have been experiencing for the past year are certainly painful, they’re also nothing new. Historically, the tide of business success continually ebbs and flows, with one market experiencing a rush of good fortune while another watches its revenue all but dry up. This cyclical nature of business is precisely why decorators must have a diverse customer base that allows them to weather slowdowns — or even meltdowns — in parts of the economy.
September 02, 2009

Jacket Sales Stay Warm 
Styles and price points may change, but thankfully, jacket sales won’t cool off anytime soon.
When the going gets tough, the tough keep going — and they keep wearing jackets. That’s the positive message from numerous industry suppliers, who say that even as the economy continues to sag, sales for jackets remain robust — albeit often at lower price points and in different styles.
September 01, 2009