Anyone into Sewing?

I just made my sister a pair of rain chaps. Not only did I make them so skinny that she might struggle to pull them over her ARMS but I failed to complete the task before she left for her Tour de Mont Blanc. Nonetheless I had a good time on my first project in decades (not an exaggeration), and I’m fired up to try again, hopefully in time for her next adventure. Id include a photo but they’re chaps (how interesting can that be) and black so very hard to make a decent image. 

I made another chest harness, this one specifically for LRS with my El Mudo.  It also works for TRS, of course.  on the back is an adjustable tether that goes to the waist belt to keep the front attachment point consistent.

Looking to get my first sewing machine and am struggling to narrow down what features I should be looking for. Would like to eventually work with Gore-Tex fabric and maybe some UHMWPE for custom packs, but basic knit/woven fabrics will be the starting point. Are there any one-size-fits-all machines that can handle these different fabrics and won’t completely break the bank?

Quick chalk bucket. Pretty fun to make, challenged myself to use no square or ruler which was interesting. Added magnets under the pink webbing, which maybe will prevent me from spilling chalk? 

Anyone have recommendations for a good jogger pattern? Specifically ones that you’ve ended up enjoying climbing in.

Ryan Cwrote:

Looking to get my first sewing machine and am struggling to narrow down what features I should be looking for. Would like to eventually work with Gore-Tex fabric and maybe some UHMWPE for custom packs, but basic knit/woven fabrics will be the starting point. Are there any one-size-fits-all machines that can handle these different fabrics and won’t completely break the bank?

Lightweight and stretchy fabrics tend to work well on machines made more for general home use. Make sure it has at a minimum zig-zag stitching if maintaining some semblance of stretch is important to you.

Thick fabrics, multiple layers of webbing, etc... tend to work better on more industrial walking foot machines. These machines don't tend to handle lightweight and stretchy fabrics very well. They do especially poorly if the plate on the machine that the needle dips down into has a wide opening, like to provide space for zig-zag stitching, in this case the opening can tend to allow the lightweight fabric to get pulled down into the machine at worst, or bunch up really badly.

You can often get by with heavier fabrics and webbing on a smaller home machine by hand cranking the wheel, just being careful to not deflect the needle much at all when doing so, or it will break.

Short answer: a singer heavy duty.

Leather tooled coozie i made recently. Sort of climbing related… kinda.

Desert Rock Sportswrote:

Short answer: a singer heavy duty.

second this. i have one. it good.

Here are some recent projects from Will Sew For Bolts.  The white/red tray is our largest basket yet based on the extremely-stiff, static, work rope.

If anyone here is interested in selling or custom making one of their 20-30L alpine/multi pitch bags for me, I'd love to chat!

After lurking on this thread for a long time I finally had the courage to try a couple of repairs. I replaced the bottom of my backpack using just a regular at-home sewing machine, with some hand cranking in a couple of thicker spots. Learned a lot. The stiff plastic spine of the bag was sewn into the bag so I couldn't turn it inside out and had to do a lot of seam ripping to get the spine detached. After replacing the bottom, it became clear that the seams that I ripped did more than just attach the spine to the fabric... they attached the hip belts and the top of the shoulder straps!! So I had to hand sew those back on. Lesson learned- will do a lot more thinking and inspecting before I just start seam ripping willy nilly next time. The hand sewing is holding up great so far.

Also did a tune-up on my crack gloves. Replaced the thumb loops as well as the wrist strap - some excess strap from an old backpack turned out to be the perfect width! Also tried to repair the place where the strap feeds through like in this video, but that hasn't held up super great so far, but it is chugging along.

Caroline Yearwoodwrote:Also tried to repair the place where the strap feeds through like in this video, but that hasn't held up super great so far, but it is chugging along.

I’ve gotten the strap slot on my crack gloves to hold up pretty well by gluing fabric to the outside of the glove and then stitching around the slot with heavy thread. The stitching seems to lower the friction of the strap through the slot by quite a bit, which seems to help a lot with the wear and tear.

It’s not clear in the photo, but I glued patches to both sides here.

James McFwrote:

I’ve gotten the strap slot on my crack gloves to hold up pretty well by gluing fabric to the outside of the glove and then stitching around the slot with heavy thread. The stitching seems to lower the friction of the strap through the slot by quite a bit, which seems to help a lot with the wear and tear.

It’s not clear in the photo, but I glued patches to both sides here.

That looks super sturdy - what kind of glue did you use?

I just wanted to show what I've been working on. I've been sewing off and on for a while but I got a Juki HZL-NX7 almost two years ago and I've been sewing a lot since then. Nothing too complicated, stuff sacks, grocery totes, tool holders, boxy bags, zipper pouches, etc. Pretty basic. Here's some photos.

Below, some roll-top bags and a stuff sack. Mostly Robic, but the red is HyperD.

Below, a tool belt and some tool holders. black Neoprene, blue X-Pac VX-21 bear spray holder, pink Neoprene, black 210D gridstop cell-phone holder. I'm pretty new to binding, so I was relieved with the results here. 

Boxy bags. The yellow is EPLX200 ECOPAK.

Black lunch tote and silverware pouch. The yellow is a food-safe PUL - polyurethane laminate.

Grocery tote. I have several, using various fabrics. They are really strong and hold a lot of groceries. Adjustable straps to hand-carry or to use over-the-shoulder. This is the VX21 with blue gridstop interior.

Another large grocery tote, this one in MARPAT.

The Juki HZL-NX7 has been treating me well. My other machine is a Juki HZL-355, a basic mechanical machine, which I found a little difficult to control. I like the computerized functions on the NX7, especially being able to go forward or backward very slowly, even a stitch at a time and also ending each movement with the needle in the down position. I've occasionally used a Juki DNU-1541 at work for stage rigging. I am considering purchasing one, maybe next year. As an industrial, it moves very quickly. I've only used that machine with the older-style clutch motor which is hard to feather slowly. I'm eager to try the industrial with a newer servo motor to see if control is any easier without sacrificing power.

My favorite quick and dirty project: turning an ikea bag into a proper rope bag. This is now my favorite rope bag by a large margin and solves the main drawback of the ikea rope bag which is its “to the crag” mobility. Now I can stuff it into a crag pack quite easily or carry it like a duffel with a bit more mobility than the huge unfolded bag

Pay no attention to my godawful bar tacks or box stitches 

Caroline Yearwoodwrote:

That looks super sturdy - what kind of glue did you use?

I used barge cement

https://www.acehardware.com/departments/paint-and-supplies/tape-glues-and-adhesives/glues-and-epoxy/17338

John Hegyeswrote:

Those all look great!

I only tried neoprene once, for a laptop sleeve. Zigzag stitch as an edge overwrap instead of binding. I didn't work very well, feels like it will rip out pretty easily. I think neoprene you have to really dial in stitch spacing and tension. Too tight of spacing and too much tension and the thread will just cut through the neoprene.

Clutch are really frustrating to use. My first industrial was that style. For anyone who hasn't used one... picture turning on a drill press motor below your desk, it spins up to speed and has a shit ton of horsepower for a light duty task like sewing, then with a foot pedal you have to feather engagement of a drive surface with it and between the foot pedal and one hand on the manual wheel, get the speed you want. You can change out pulleys to reduce the speed a bit, and I did this, but its still generally way more speed than you would ever want when full pedal. They generally do have a handy feature to wind a bobbin at the same time that you are sewing though.

Back when I had my large industrial with servo, I really wanted to swap the clutch motor out for one of these:
https://reliablecorporation.com/collections/motors
If you get the synchronizer too you can do needle position stuff like single stitches stopping with the needle down, etc...

I think most of the nicer relatively newer industrial machines like the Juki's generally come with a servo setup that lets you do single needle stitches, needle position stuff, etc...

Neoprene cement is a good alternative to the sewing machine when working with wetsuit material. I used a neoprene cap for skiing I made from neoprene scraps I got for pennies (free?) from the O’Neil factory in the’80s. It was great, especially in wet conditions. I used it a lot more for surfing of course but was surprised by how functional it was in the mountains. 

Does anybody have tips or links to tutorials on improving technique for shoulder straps? I seem to have a hard time sizing and shaping the foam to be a nice tight fit, and also struggle with getting the seams falling the right way down the whole length of the straps and it all looks super janky.

Nick Niebuhrwrote:

Does anybody have tips or links to tutorials on improving technique for shoulder straps?

I haven’t watched this myself, but noticed it recently when looking at some of their online info.