Sails sewing tools

Fish&Chip

Fish&Chip

Joined
Jan 15, 2020
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Location
Trois-Rivières, QC
Hi, I would like to know if some of you used hemmer and cording foots for sewing ? I saw by chance those foot in action on Youtube on regular fabric and I am asking in my self if this kind of tools could be used for sails sewing as exemple to install bolt rope ?
 
I saw somewhere a guy who made it, but not with the foot mentionned here. He putted the rope on the fabric, made a zizag sewing over the rope and plied the fabric to made the final normal point sewing, letting the rope like "outside" the border of the fabric. Unfurtunately, I do not have reference to show you his work. I just think that thew hemmer can help to regularise the distance between the border and the rope and the cording to made a strait uniform installation of the bolt rope over the fabric.
 
Fish&Chip said:
I saw somewhere a guy who made it, but not with the foot mentionned here. He putted the rope on the fabric, made a zizag sewing over the rope and plied the fabric to made the final normal point sewing, letting the rope like "outside" the border of the fabric. Unfurtunately, I do not have reference to show you his work. I just think that thew hemmer can help to regularise the distance between the border and the rope and the cording to made a strait uniform installation of the bolt rope over the fabric.
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Sounds really clever. Perhaps this may work. Sew the bolt rope along the end on one side of the fabric with a cross stitch as you mentioned, then turn the fabric such that the bolt rope is facing down, then use a narrow hemmer foot like in the video below to fold and sew the edge of the fabric down, leaving the bolt rope positioned at the edge of the fold in the hem. That may work as long as the hem foot can accept the bolt rope and the fold occurs right where the bolt rope is. Anyhow, it will take lots of practice if you can get it to work, but could save a lot of time.

Or, it could end up being a huge mess and you have to sew the bolt rope onto the hemmed edge by hand anyway.

 
My wife is a quilter and an expert on sewing…she says the effort to get the relationship between the rope and the fabric edge correct is extremely difficult to start and maintain. She suggests that sewing by hand is not only more precise but actually quicker considering the task of guiding the rope/fabric combination through the hem foot. Just a word of experience….
 
danielsje said:
My wife is a quilter and an expert on sewing…she says the effort to get the relationship between the rope and the fabric edge correct is extremely difficult to start and maintain. She suggests that sewing by hand is not only more precise but actually quicker considering the task of guiding the rope/fabric combination through the hem foot. Just a word of experience….
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Great input Daniel. Thank your wife for benefitting us with her experience. I wonder if the thin Navara white lawn fabric would look okay with the edge hemmed by machine? If the hem appears tubular and not a perfectly flat fold, it would detract from the accurate appearance of the sail. Oh hey... I know! Just steam iron the hem after it's done and before the bolt rope is sewn on. Yeah, I'm posting my thoughts live again. . .
 
I actually had my wife help me sew up a set of sails…she did hem the edges…came out great…but she still suggests hand sewing the rope to the hemmed edges…
 
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