II. PATTERNS + SEWING

Layouts and Cutting | Sewing

The job of this book is to make it possible for anyone with normal dexterity to construct the basic gear for climbing and camping. It would be foolish to say it's all easy. It isn't. The secret is in the planning. Before actual construction of any item described begins, it must be understood, carefully planned and laid out. If these preliminary steps are bypassed or skimmed over discouraging difficulties may be experienced later on. This chapter will help with the careful planning necessary for success. No great skill is required—but a lot of patience is. One of the great virtues of sewing is that it can be ripped out and done again if a mistake is made.

There will be detailed dimensional drawings, step-by-step in­structions and complete materials lists for a few of the most gen­erally useful items of equipment and in addition there will be a complete discussion of design considerations, materials and con­struction details for each type of gear. The aim is to present the problems involved and to help the reader become familiar with the performance required of his equipment. He will eventually be able to design equipment to suit his particular needs. This will, of course, potentially provide him with the best possible equipment available anywhere.

LAYOUT AND CUTTING

The patterns for all the small items of equipment such as cloth­ing and packs can be laid out on a good sized table. The materials for large pieces of equipment such as tents and sleeping bags should be laid out on the floor—preferably away from cats and small children, although this difficulty seems to be a standard hazard. Occasionally a sleeping bag can be laid out on a very large table.

A paper pattern should be cut out for. all the more complicated shapes. This will include clothing and some of the packs. By careful measuring, chalk marks can be laid out directly on the fabric for the more rectangular packs, tents, and sleeping bags.

Drawings of the more complicated pieces are marked off in squares to make it easier to transfer the exact outline to the full size required for the project.

A large sheet of wrapping paper should be marked off in squares of the size indicated in the drawings for the item to be made. It will be a simple matter to transfer the rectangular shapes to the large paper. For the curved and complicated outlines the tech­nique is to notice where the outline crosses the various squares on the scale drawing and to copy this carefully onto the squared paper so the outline crosses the squares in the same proportion. It is a help to take a straight edged piece of cardboard and near one end mark off the length of one side of a square on the small drawing and divide this into eight equal parts. Near the other end lay off the length of the side of one square of the large drawing and divide this also into eight equal parts. Using these two scales on their respective drawings it will be easy to measure the spot at which the outline crosses each square and precisely transfer these intersections from the small to the large drawing.

The parts for most of the packs can be marked off directly onto the fabric. The parts should be nested for the most economical cutting. Intelligent use can be made of the selvage so that it falls where it is desirable to have a nonfraying edge.

The large pieces of tents and sleeping bags must sometimes be roughed out first. Pieces are sewn together to form a blank of the approximate outline, large enough on which to lay out the exact outline. Such a pieced seam should be a flat felled seam, and in the case of tents it should be felled like a shingle to shed the water. These large pieces must be carefully cut to take advantage of the fact that most patterns are symmetrical. The remaining angle left from each piece cut on a particular angle can be re­versed forming the correct angle for one side of the corresponding piece on the other side. This is only true of reversible fabrics. This foresight and planning saves yards of material which would otherwise be wasted.

A mistake in cutting is not an irrevocable catastrophe. The fabric can always be pieced together with neat felled seams and cut again.

A tailor's chalk or wax marking crayon should be used for all marks. Chalk will rub off when the marks are no longer needed and the crayon marks can be melted out with a warm iron. If the material is to be handled much during construction crayon will stick longer
A yardstick of the kind given free by lumber companies is essen­tial. An eight foot steel tape is very handy for the larger pieces. A very satisfactory 8 foot straightedge can be made from a piece of lattice selected for straightness from a local lumber company. This can be used for laying out pieces too long for the yardstick.

A good pair of long bladed shears can be used for all cutting. Pinking shears may come in especially handy for clothing.

Cut edges of nylon must always be treated to prevent fraying. If finished seams of some sort are used, or if the seams are bound with tape so that no raw edges are left exposed in the completed item the nylon can be left as cut. Otherwise when exposed edges are left they can be secured against fraying by melting them very slightly in the flame of a candle. If pinking shears are used the ends of the pinks can be melted very quickly in a flame.

SEWING

It might be a great help for the novice to obtain a good basic book on sewing and read it through to learn the terms and basic information offered there. Many of these techniques are ap­plicable to this equipment and will give assurance as well as added information.

A sewing machine is almost essential for tents, sleeping bags and clothing due to the great number of seams. However, packs can be sewn by hand. If a sewing machine is not available at home and one of the long-seam projects is planned, it is a good idea to rent one. Good machines are generally available for rent at local sewing centers. The lockstitch machine, the seams of which will not pull out, is better than the chainstitch machine. The rotary bobbin will sew faster than the long shuttle type. Even though a machine is used, some difficult-to-reach spots may have to be sewn by hand. For this type of work a couple of sturdy needles and a thimble will do the job, or a sailmakers palm can be used to sew the heaviest materials. For hand sewing a little beeswax will not only strengthen the thread but will help prevent nylon thread from kinking.

Frequently we get the comment that many of these jobs aren't possible on a home sewing machine. Most of them are. There is tremendous variation in sewing machines after a year or two of use, even of the same make and year. It should be emphasized that the machine should be in good working order! Frequently a machine will have minor troubles which go unnoticed with or­dinary sewing, or cause minor inconvenience which is put up with. These faults should be corrected before beginning these equip­ment projects. Most important is the understanding of how a machine works. Patience and practice in technique will usually show that the job can be done, and done well.

As we have mentioned before, in using nylon or other synthetic thread in a sewing machine some trouble may be encountered and it will help to understand the operation of the machine. On one side of the needle there is a long groove. On the opposite side near the eye there is a depression. As the needle penetrates the material on the downstroke it will drag the thread along with it. As soon as the needle starts back up again, the thread lying in the groove will come up with the needle, but the thread on the opposite side, having no groove to lie in, will stick against the material. This action forms a small loop of thread alongside the needle which the sewing hook in a rotary bobbin machine, or the point of the shuttle in a shuttle machine, will pick up and pass around the bobbin case to form the lockstitch. The synthetic threads, especially nylon, are so elastic that they will stretch con­siderably on the downstroke and will snap back at the beginning of the upstroke, forming no loop for the hook to pick up. This causes the familiar dropped stitch when the machine refuses to sew. At other times the loop is only partly formed and the sewing hook neatly splits the thread causing an even worse mess.

Several things can be done to remedy this difficulty. First, an extra large needle can be used to make a large hole and reduce the friction against the thread on the downstroke. In leather and other dense non-woven materials a chisel point needle may be used which will actually cut through the material rather than merely push it aside as a regular needle does.   Regular needles can be ground to a chisel point on an oilstone. All this tends to reduce the friction against the thread on the downstroke thus re­ducing the stretching.

The second correction that may be made is in the thread ten­sions. These tensions may be loosened as far as possible which will ease the tension on the thread thus reducing the amount of stretching on the downstroke. Great care must be used in ad­justing the bobbin tension since a fraction of a turn on the ten­sion screw will make an appreciable difference. The top tension should then be adjusted to match the bobbin. Sewing a practice scrap will show whether the tensions are evenly adjusted. They should sew a stitch which is the same on either side of the ma­terial. If one tension is tighter than the other it will pull the thread through to that side and produce an irregular looking seam.

When the going gets too heavy for the machine, the flywheel may be slowly turned by hand making one stitch* at a time. Some surprisingly thick materials can be sewn in this manner. It is important to go very slowly after the needle has entered the ma­terial until it is well on its way back up again. This allows the sewing hook to catch on the loop of thread.

One good stitch for hand sewing is illustrated. This backstitch gives a good strong continuous seam.

For sewing leather and other material too heavy for the ma­chine a stitching awl is recommended. A stitching awl is a small hand tool which produces a lockstitch as the machine does but which uses a very heavy thread and a very sharp edged needle which can be pushed through almost any material. These awls are usually equipped with several needles including a curved one which can be used for stitching when it is impossible to sew from both sides of the material.

Following are descriptions of general sewing terms which will be used throughout the book, and general instructions for items which are used with several pieces of gear, such as zippers with packs, tents, sleeping bags, etc.

Plain Seam

Match the edges to be joined, right sides together, and stitch once about ¼"in from the edge and a second time about ⅛"in to retard raveling. This seam is used only where the wrong side will not be exposed or in packs where the heavy fabric prevents a more finished seam. This same seam can be bound with seam binding the second time around to give a more finished appear­ance and complete security against raveling.

Ham Seam

This seam is similar to the plain seam except that the edges are folded over before stitching. They are folded either once (rough hem seam) or twice (finished hem seam) and this is used to join light fabrics such as in sleeping bags to prevent down going through the seams, or where a finished seam is wanted with a minimum of needle holes such as in a coated fabric tarp.

Flat Felled Seam

This is a common dressmaking seam and the one used most often in camping equipment and clothes. However, we generally make the seam inside out so it is felled up on the inside. This gives fewer stitches on the outside of tents and the fabric laps like a shingle so it will shed water. The first step is to match the edges to be joined, right sides together, and stitch ½" on from the edge. Next, if the fabric is heavy, the direction of the fell is de­cided and the underneath flap trimmed to half its width. If the fabric is light there is no need to bother with trimming. Finally, fold the flap of the fabric over and stitch down. A rough felled seam has this folded just once and is used where extremely heavy fabrics are encountered or often just for an inch or so when one felled seam crosses another making too many layers for easy stitch­ing. A finished felled seam is folded twice so all rough edges are covered.

Top Stitched Seam

This seam is used to sew outside pockets, etc., to packs. It eliminates the need for sewing inside the pocket and yet it pro­vides an inside edge that can't ravel past the first stitching. Though usually left rough, this can also be finished by folding the edge one more time and allowing an extra ¼"for this in cutting.

Insertion Seam

Often there is a double piece to be joined to a single piece of fabric. This is done by matching all the edges to be joined with the double pieces on the outsides, right sides together, and sew­ing in about ⅜" from the edges. The outside pieces are then folded back away from the inserted piece, aligned with each other, pulled tight against the first stitched seam and then stitched to­gether ¼"from the original seam. Sometimes double pieces are joined at each side to a single piece.  The first side is easy to do
but the second side requires all the rest of the item to be stuffed between the double pieces for the first stitch. With the light fab­rics used for this equipment this can usually be done without trouble.

Plain Hem

This hem is used to provide a clean edge to any piece of fabric not sewn to something else. The width of the hem is its finished width and in most cases there will be two folds to produce a fin­ished hem with no raw edges. Occasionally a rough hem will be used in leather or coated fabrics, or with a selvedge that can't fray, and these are folded only once.

Drawhems

A plain hem can often be used to contain a drawstring but it is often necessary to install a hem for a drawstring in the center of a piece such as at the waist of a parka. This hem is made of a strip of fabric at least 1½" wide, pieced to length if necessary. Sew the first edge inside out, then fold the second edge and stitch down. A drawhem is often needed around a parka face opening or cuffs and these are finished off with a facing type of hem which must be cut at least 2½" wide. First place right side of the facing against the right side of the opening, edges matching, and sew around ¼" in. Then fold the facing strip around against the inside, be­ing careful that it lies flat, and top stitch it slightly out from the first seam. This facing is often used without any drawstring just to finish off a rough opening. In all cases, if the ends of the draw-hems will be exposed, fold over several times before stitching for the first time.

Zippers

There are several ways of mounting zippers according to their use. It is better to illustrate these than to try to explain them. Refer to Figures 1 to 5, Plate I. One point to remember is always to have the zipper on top of the fabric when machine sewing to prevent puckering the zipper. The length of a zipper is meas­ured by the total length of metal including the end stops. In time a zipper can be sewn without first pinning, but it is easier at first to press the folded edges of a slot first and pin the zipper in ex­actly as it is to be. In all cases where fabric flaps cover the zipper, these are folded and sewn to the zipper before installing.

Web Straps

Web, unlike leather, cannot be cut to shape without fraying so some means is needed to taper the ends of wide straps to receive the hardware that attaches them to the narrow straps. Soft web­bing can simply be folded over at the corners as in Fig. 6, Plate I, and the hardware attached with a short length of the narrow web. A longer and neater taper can be made by first cutting a Vee in the end of the strap, Fig. 7, Plate I, and sewing this together. Then cover the stitching with a piece of the narrow webbing that also holds the hardware.

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