Find out why the new Brother BQ3100 is a must-have for quilters

This week I’m introducing you to the new Brother Innov-ís BQ3100 machine, also known as The Achiever Sewing & Quilting Machine. This wonderful machine is one of the Quilt Club series of machines for sewing and quilting. You can check out all the features of the BQ3100 machine by clicking on the Specifications tab on the Brother website.

The BQ3100 machine is very similar to the BQ3050 machine which I used in several previous QUILTsocial blog posts. If you use the search feature on QUILTsocial, you can discover those earlier posts. But, the BQ3100 has even more great features and accessories and that’s what we’re focusing on this week.

To begin with, there are dozens more decorative stitches that are now available on the Brother BQ3100 machine. Many of these stitches can be made longer or wider just by using the + or – keys at the bottom of the key pad. So now you have even more opportunities for creativity.

Of course, I had to try some of the new stitches right away and I was really impressed by the intricate new designs that are now available. I made some stitch samples I can keep for future reference. As you can see, I made single stitch patterns as well as combinations of stitches. When using decorative stitches, be sure to use a stabilizer on the back of the fabric. I used a tear-away stabilizer, but there are also many other stabilizers available.

Another stitch that is very useful for quilters is the hand-look quilting stitch. You can select 3 different variations of this stitch. They’re located in the Q group of stitches on the keypad. The stitches in this group are all designed especially for quilters.

When using the hand-look quilting stitches, use monofilament or thread that matches your fabric in the top and use a light-weight thread that shows up on your fabric in the bobbin. Here are my first samples using these stitches. The first 4 rows were stitched using the N foot, but because I was stitching through 2 layers of fabric plus batting (just like in a regular quilt), I used the new MuVit walking foot for the rest of my samples and found that I liked the results much better.

Talking about the walking foot, Brother has re-designed the MuVit walking foot for the Brother BQ3100 machine. This new foot is now more compact than the previous one and has a small, raised area at the back, so your fabric and batting always feed through evenly without bunching up at the back.

The MuVit foot also comes with the standard sole plate plus 4 additional sole plates: open toe, stitch in the ditch, couching foot and foot with ¼” guide. Have a look at this video to see the MuVit foot in action. This is an older video, but it’s an excellent guide for using the MuVit foot.

The Brother BQ3100 machine comes with a full printed manual as well as 4 extra booklets full of all kinds of information about the use of the included attachments.

Be sure to come back tomorrow when I show you how to use the Brother BQ3100 machine to make some heart-shaped blocks perfect for Valentine’s Day.

This is part 1 of 5 in this series

Go to part 2: This basic heart quilt block starts with a free pattern (tutorial)