Exploring the advanced sewing modes and features of the HV Designer Quartz 29

Yesterday, I introduced you to the basic features of the new Husqvarna VIKING Designer Quartz 29.

What do you think so far? I’m impressed so far and haven’t even sewn on it or touched the Wi-Fi capabilities!

Today, I’ll look at the sewing mode features, and try out several of the stitches. Let’s get started!

The Husqvarna VIKING Designer Quartz 29

Here’s the home screen for sewing mode. What do you think I’m going to say? YES, there’s a diagram of this screen in the User’s Guide. When you get your Husqvarna VIKING Designer Quartz 29, you must sit at the sewing machine and familiarize yourself with these buttons!

Here’s a quick overview of the top row – Sewing Mode indication, access to mySewnet, the multi-select tool to create sequences of decorative stitches, and Machine Settings. In the bottom row are, Save Stitch sequence, Delete a file and Delete stitch (grayed out because nothing is selected), Sewing Settings, and Stop/Start. I’ll be exploring some of those options later this week.

Just reading those two ribbon bars tells me there are many options in this sewing and embroidery machine, and that I can customize it to work for me!

The sewing mode screen

Let’s look at the options for choosing and editing stitches. I’ve selected a two-step zigzag to illustrate this. I see the recommended foot in the top left and a graphic of the selected stitch. As I change the stitch length and width, the changes appear on the screen. Along the top are the 5 stitch menus. The first menu is Utility Stitches (54), the second is the decorative stitches (188), Buttonhole Stitches (8), Fonts (4), and the last menu is for Saved Stitch Sequences. The arrows beneath the stitches on the screen permit me to move between stitches within each menu.

Wow, that’s amazing!

The sewing mode screen

Looking closer at the bottom half of that screen, I see the edit options for the stitches, starting with the ability to switch between single-needle or twin-needle settings, thread cutter, and mirror the stitches side to side or top to bottom. There’s even a balance option if needed.

I can change the width (maximum 7.0 mm) or the length and have the ability to reposition the needle/stitch depending on the stitch width. There are 29 stitch positions for a straight stitch.

Did you notice that there is a thread cutter and a Stop/Start on the function panel, as well as on the sewing screen?

These are valuable tools, and sitting at the sewing machine and playing with them is essential to get familiar with how they work. Playing with them will help you remember they are there when needed!

The stitch editing tools

Now, let’s look at the Machine Settings which we find in the top right-hand corner. Select your appropriate language or learn to sew in another language! You can save and retrieve files from USBs when a USB is connected. Additional settings depend on whether you are in sewing or embroidery mode, and you’ll also find the firmware version here. The final setting is the ability to lock the screen. If you have young children around, you may want to lock the screen, especially when embroidering, so nothing goes awry!

The Machine Settings Menu

There are numerous options in the sewing settings, and it’s best to try them out while you are sewing. Experiment with them to find the setting that suits your preferences and habits. And yes, all of these are explained in the User’s Guide!

What impresses me is that there are so many ways to customize this entry-level sewing and embroidery machine to how you work. So, if you are using this machine at a retreat or as a second embroidery machine at your house, you’ll find many of the settings on this machine that you have on your larger machines.

The sewing settings screen

Now that I’ve finished browsing the screens to familiarize myself with the various options, it’s time to sew!

I pulled out the ¼” Edge Stitching Foot from my stash of presser feet. It has a guide along the side. The beauty of the presser foot ankle is that you can use the feet from your other Husqvarna machine if you have one.

Now, here’s one thing that will drive me mad. I don’t know how many times people have purchased a ¼” piecing foot and can’t get a correct seam allowance, and they blame it entirely on the foot. You must do a test because that seam allowance will depend on the type of ¼” foot you have chosen, the thread weight and many other factors. I talk about the ¼” seam allowance test in this blog post. Do yourself a favor and test – always.

The ¼” Edge Stitching Foot

I wanted to use the guide along the edge, so I moved the needle to the right to line it up with the red mark. Remember, moving the needle on the sewing screen is easy. After a quick test and several adjustments, I got a very accurate ¼” seam.

When chain piecing, I find that there is plenty of room to put my next piece under the foot and right up to the needle without having to lift the presser foot.

Sewing with the ¼” Edge Stitching Foot

Here’s another myth I’m going to bust. Remember how everyone used to say that you must sew the entire project on the same sewing machine, or the seams wouldn’t match? Well, the project I’m working on is a UFO I acquired from someone else! Guess what? After I found the sweet spot on the Designer Quartz 29, the new seams perfectly matched the existing seams, and the little squares are 2½” square with no trimming needed.

Squares pieced on multiple machines are the correct size

Here are a couple of tips when sewing:

• Remember to test your stitch length. Does it need to be 2.0 or 2.5? Check to see if the seam will come apart at the ends.
• Ensure you hold your fabric pieces until they have passed the needle to get consistent seam allowances from the top to the bottom. Don’t let go as you near the end, as the seams will be wonky.

Here’s an example of the stitch quality. I didn’t touch the tension, and all was good.

Beautifully formed stitches

The straight stitching is amazing, and it’s super easy to get an accurate ¼” seam allowance. I’ll continue working on my adopted UFO, but I wanted to check out a couple of other stitches that any quilter would wish to use, especially if they are into applique.

I checked the User’s Guide, where all 54 stitches in the Utility Menu are listed. This includes the name and a description of where I would use each stitch, along with the appropriate presser foot. Even after many years of sewing, I find this information very helpful.

There are 3 preset satin stitches. They are the same stitch, just preset to different widths.

The satin stitches listed in the User’s Guide

The quality of the satin stitch is critical to me, so I decided to test it out. I fused an applique shape to a background square and cut a piece of Tear-A-Way stabilizer for the back. Always use a stabilizer when using the satin stitch.

Tear-A-Way stabilizer for the back of my satin stitch

The recommended foot is the B foot, but I like to use the Open Toe foot to see the stitches better. I pulled the Open Toe foot from my stash and snapped it onto the presser foot ankle. Can you see how practical that presser foot ankle is?

The recommended foot is the B foot

I chose the 6 MM wide satin stitch. Remember, I could make it as wide as 7 MM. I used a high-contrast thread to check the coverage and a regular white thread in the bobbin as I was too lazy to wind a bobbin weight thread for the bobbin. Again, let’s push the machine and see what happens. In other words, I did everything we would not usually do in the applique world, but I wanted to know how the Designer Quartz 29 would perform.

Using the Open-Toe applique foot for satin stitch

Here are the results. Notice the satin stitch on the bottom part of the shape doesn’t provide dense coverage. It’s not often that we’ll use such high-contrast thread with a stitch that wide. But let’s suppose that we want to. How do we fix that? I shortened the stitch length from the default of .8 to .6 and left everything else the same. See how the coverage in the top part of the shape is fantastic!

You can make anything look amazing by understanding the tools and supplies! It pays to make samples and play!

The Designer Quartz 29 passed the satin stitch test!

You can see the shortened stitch length on the screen and you can tell by the colored box around the number that it’s no longer the default. That’s the beauty of all these stitches. They start with a default, but if you’re unhappy after testing, don’t hesitate to change the width, length, stitch, or needle position. Remember that the width of the stitch will dictate how much you can move the needle to the left or right.

The default stitch length has been adjusted

Here’s the back of the satin stitch applique. You can see how the top thread pulls to the back. That is what’s supposed to happen with a satin stitch. I might want to play with the tension slightly to reduce the amount of top thread showing through. But did you notice any of the white thread on top? Nope!

The back of the satin stitch test

The last stitch that I have time for today is the blanket stitch (sometimes called the buttonhole or applique stitch). I was shocked at how many variations there are in the Designer Quartz 29. Here are just some of the options.

Some of the options for the applique stitch

You’ll find these stitches in the Utility Menu.

Applique stitches in the Utility Menu

I fused a heart to the background fabric, used the same white piecing thread in the bobbin, and a high-contrast 40-weight thread on the top. The trick when using the blanket stitch is understanding the stitch sequence to know when to pivot. In instances like a heart, it becomes essential to know when to pivot. The blanket stitch is not dense, so there’s no need to use a stabilizer. The quality of this stitch is stunning!

The blanket stitch test

Here’s the back.

The back of the blanket stitch test

I have to say that I was very impressed with two things today. The first was all the settings, allowing me to customize how the sewing and embroidery machine would work for me. That’s very important. The second thing that impressed me about the Husqvarna VIKING Designer Quartz 29 was the quality of the stitches. Seeing such excellent quality in this entry-level sewing and embroidery machine is fantastic!

I have other things I want to try in sewing mode, but I’ll leave them until later this week. I want to dive into the embroidery mode tomorrow to check it out, so be sure to return even if you are not an embroiderer. You might want to become one!

Have a super day!!

Ciao!

This is part 2 of 5 in this series

Go back to part 1: Unboxing the Husqvarna VIKING Designer Quartz 29

Go to part 3: Designer Quartz 29 | Getting to know the machine embroidery capabilities

Print this page or save as a PDF