Juki 553 gathering light textiles

[DrmCa]

I apologize that this is not leather related, but I have no one else to ask. Last night I was helping my wife to set up our long not used Juki DDL-553 for sewing in invisible zippers, and it would gather finer fabrics. We used this machine in the past to stitch light upholstery leather using first Teflon feet, then a roller foot (relatively unsuccessfully - it would skip when climbing or jumping off seams), but since returned it to the textile configuration. 

The light or heavy denims and twills would stitch just fine with TEX 18 or 16 thread, but when I tried batiste with the same thread, it gathered by quite a lot. If I stretched the seam, the thread of course broke.

Tried loosening tension of the larger screw on the bobbin holder, and the nut on the top tensioner as well, but even when both threads were pretty easy to pull through, batiste would still keep gathering. We are getting slightly slanted stitches on batiste, but that is probably consistent with gathering. The denims and twills remain perfectly flat, and stitches look perfectly normal and straight.

We were using a special foot for invisible zippers, and a new size 18 TIN coated 16/257 regular point Organ needle. The machine is threaded correctly to the best of my knowledge: from the stand through the disks on the post, into the hole on the post, into the 1st and 3d holes on the top guide, into the top tensioner, through the takeup lever hook, up the takeup lever, into the hook on the needle bar and into the hole in the collar on the needle bar. Having the same poly A&E TEX 18 or 16 thread on the cone and on the bobbin. I just ran new clean oil through the machine.

So what am I doing wrong? Should I loosen bottom and top thread tension further? Or does this have anything to do with foot pressure?

[Uwe]

This really is the wrong forum. There must be others out there better suited.

It appears you're using the wrong machine to sew Batiste (had to look that one up ) The Juki DDL-553 is designed for medium to heavy weight fabrics, which is why it works fine on denim and similar fabrics.

You need a machine designed to handle delicate fabrics. The average home sewing machine is likely better suited than the Juki DDL-553. Even with suitable machines, people apparently sandwich very fine fabrics between tissue paper to give the material some stability. Then tear off the tissue paper after sewing the seam. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDADCZ20ce4 )

 

Edited February 1, 2018 by Uwe

[Wizcrafts]

I keep fusible iron on tape, a half inch wide, on hand for sewing satin linings and soft cloth. I use a Singer 31-15 for those jobs.

[DrmCa]

Yeah, I know that 553 is not a dedicated light weight machine, but it used to stitch light textiles fine before we set it up for leather. This is not really a big deal, because there will always be a zipper there to increase thickness. Perhaps I'll play with reducing threads tension more.

Another thing was that it absolutely refused to stitch with a double-toe spring loaded foot. Would not interlock the thread. As soon as I put a solid foot on it - beautiful stitches. Go figure.

Thank you!

[DrmCa]

SOLVED:

Figured that after reversed conversion to a roller foot the presser bar was not low enough to create sufficient pressure of the foot.

All I had to do was loosening screw 32 on the bracket 28 and sliding bracket 28 slightly up the presser bar, then tightening screw 32 again, referring to section 4 "Hand lifter components" on p. 7 of the parts list attached.

Now the foot is resting on the feed dog teeth and not floating in the air above them, and there is no more gathering and stitches form at all times with all feet even on the thinnest fabrics.

DDL-5530 Parts List.pdf