This is my 1st knit shirt I've done. However please tell me why I have a hole forming where the red circle is? I used a knit needle, sticky and tear away stabilizers and mesh on the top. The design came from Sewforum.

Don't get discouraged by the tiny hole. It has happened to us all at some time or the other. Everyone has given good advice about the weight of the fabric, density of stitches, etc,. Good luck.

This is lovely! Well Done!

mpo14011 and psssst you both are right on your comments in my opinion. See, I said that a person always should do a test sample first of any design on a piece of fabric made of the same material as the garment, exactly for that very reason. The person needs to know how the design will work on the kind of fabric she wants the design on. Usually the stock designs are digitized for cotton not for knits, right, but, it's always possible that the knits get very good result too. That is, IF the design is well digitized, in first place, and naturally even a well digitized design can go bad on a bad knit also. That's why the sample is useful...
About the good/bad digitizing, that's why the sample is needed too. As you say a professional digitizer who cares for his business logically will test his job first, but so many do not do this, and here I say, if you don't know the digitizer, take care, after all, it's your machine, your investment, not his, that will have to have the bad experience. Please, don't get mad at me. I'm just sharing my experience of more than 10 years of digitizing, I don't want to point my fingers on someone's nose. But everybody knows that always, in any profession that are good and bad professionals, and on the above design, it's clear that the digitizing is missing quality. I want to upload a picture where I can show why I say that, just need a clue on how I could do it on this forum, as it's not a project of mine, and I don't want to go against any rules, so I don't know where I could upload it. But if it's not OK doing it here, if anyone wants to see it, I could send that picture personally, maybe...

I would like to upload an edit of this picture to show what I mean, and so everyone can see it too. where should I upload it on this forum? should I upload as a project? Sorry, this is the first time I'm willing to do this here and I don't know how should I do it, because it should go as a reply to this topic.

2 comments

by psssst 09 Feb 2010

The only places you can upload pics is in community and personals. I believe since what you are talking about is embroidery related it should go into community. You can not add a pic until after your initial post then open the post and upload a pic.

by pasokon 09 Feb 2010

thank you very much for the clue! I will do that then.

VERY,VERY NICE!!!

I agree with mpo14011 about the testing. I am a bit confused about the getting knit designs for knits shirts. I have never seen a design listed for a type of fabric other than FSL. In my experience sometimes it can be the quality of the actual shirt. I have stitched on name brand knit shirts with no problem. Same design on a $2 walmart shirt and I have had the fabric pulling, pinched and get holes. I do use sticky back tear away and a ball point needle. I also agree with lbrow place some fray block on it asap and the hole will not get any bigger and maybe you can "darn" it togther.

2 comments

by mpo14011 09 Feb 2010

You are dead right about the quality of "cheap" t-shirts. No matter how good the design, they never stitch right on those.

by mpo14011 09 Feb 2010

And you probably won't. For a digitizer to digitize designs for all the different types of fabric would not be worth it. You will just have to make sure the design is a good one and stabilize well.
If you know the digitizer, you might ask him/her to digitize one for you. I have done several, privately, to go on stretch knit fabrics.

OK. Firstly, freebie or not, ALWAYS test the design on the same piece of fabric that you want to stitch the design on.
Secondly, the designs are usually digitized to go on cotton fabric, not on knit or stretch knit or anything else.So the results might be good on cottons, but not so good on other fabrics. If you are very particular how you want your design to look, choose a design that has been specifically digitized for the type of fabric you want to put it on.
Thirdly, although you do not need to use solvy on normal stretch knit or fleecy fabrics, in this case I think you do because it is knitted.
Fourthly, did you slow your machine right down? Always do letters, no matter what fabric you stitch it on, on slow speed.
I do not know what you mean by mesh.
You said you used a knit needle. Was it a ball point needle? It needs to be ball point.

As you asked, let me tell you the truth. Your big picture help a REAL DIGITIZER see clearly what happened on your embroidery job: you are not the responsible for the poor embroidery on your cloth, but the POOR DIGITIZING of the design. That's the problem with the freebies and the cheap ones: YOU are the guinea pig, and the worse thing that can happen is that the poor digitized design with lots of stitches going on the same hole can lead your expensive machine to be damaged, causing lots of extra expenses on getting it fixed, when you thought you were just saving some money with the free or cheap design. But if your machine can survive to the bad designs she had to stitch, you can still get frustrated with the bad appearance on your cloth, because the poor digitized design really will give a disgusting effect after embroidered. Sorry to hear you had such experience. The only thing you can do to prevent this to happen on your embroidered clothes, if you don't know the design quality, and still want to stitch it, is to embroider a sample of the same fabric of your garment first. Then if your machine survive the experience(lucky you), you have the chance to see how the embroidered design looks like, and choose to do not damage your cloth after all. The wise thing to do is NOT embroider any freebies found over the internet that is being offered from a digitizer you don't know, AND even do test a sample piece first of the ones that come from the well known good digitizers. After all, even when a person doesn't understand how to distinguish a well digitized design, she can understand how a good one looks like after embroidered. Hope this helps. Sorry everyone for making it long...

1 comment

by mpo14011 09 Feb 2010

I would just like to say that not all freebies are bad. If the digitizer cares about his business, he/she will test ALL designs, including the freebies. I ALWAYS test ALL of my designs, no matter if I give them away as freebies or not.

looks very good

1 comment

by gerryvb 09 Feb 2010

don't know about the whole, perhaps too many stitches on same spot

Very nice!!*

The shirt looks very nice, regardless of the hole!

nice font ****

Perhaps the design is too dense for this thin cloth, I think that an emmbroidery needle is better.*4U

A very nice design, looks nice on the shirt (hole and all). *4U

Monica, it looks great, if the fabric is very thin, you need to use designs with very few stitches. As Lillian has said put ome fray check on it so that it does not go any further. Hugs Yvonne

Put some fray check on it quickly!!Do not know unless there is flaw in design. I do not use knit needles, only embroidery needles, could there possibly have been a flaw in shirt. Is the hole in shirt or just the design? The design looks great. *

1 comment

by mad14kt 07 Feb 2010

Thanks Lillian the hole is in the shirt. The material is very thin ;D *2U