One of the most frequent production-related questions I receive is how to make embroidery on stretchy performance-knit polyester look good. Performance knits are perhaps the trickiest substrates embroiderers have to deal with. They come in many brands, styles, weights and fabric properties, but one characteristic remains constant: These fabrics stretch in all directions. This makes for particularly challenging embroidery; it’s like sewing on a rubber band. Success depends on quality digitizing from programmers who know what they’re doing, as well as superior embroidery technique from a machine operator.

Whenever you work with performance knits, the first thing to do is let your digitizer know. Not all designs are friendly to these products, no matter what tweaks we make. Digitizers must use special techniques to help ensure successful embroidery, which means a design digitized specifically for performance fabric might not work well for other fabrics. Always run a sample on the specific fabric you’re using before committing to a production run and making a very expensive mistake.

Preparing a performance knit for high-quality embroidery takes extra time, but the method below has been proven to work in a production facility with more than 1,100 embroidery heads producing more than 4 million garments a year. It’s not the only method out there, but if you want to save money by reducing damaged product and lost productivity, give it a try.

Video

For more tips on how to handle performance fabrics, check out this webinar from Madeira. Among the topics covered are the best approach to designs and digitizing, choosing the correct backing, how to hoop performance fabrics and which needle and thread to use.

The most important factor when dealing with performance fabric is using embroidery backing to stabilize and reduce fabric stretch. Proper backing with quality digitizing and the spray adhesive technique described here will allow for superior results.

Note: Sticky backings are available through various suppliers and can be substituted for the spray adhesive technique. However, those backings are more expensive than using my technique with your favorite quality backing.

Follow these steps for embroidering on performance fabrics:

1. Make sure your digitizer is 100% aware that you will be using performance fabric. This is critical.

2. Use a high-quality 3.5-ounce or heavier cutaway backing.

3. Turn your garment inside out.

4. Lightly spray the center of your backing with KK-100 or a similar fabric adhesive, then apply the backing to the inside of the shirt where the embroidery will go, taking care not to stretch the material. Make sure there are no wrinkles or puckers under the backing. If you get any pooling of adhesive on the backing, you’ve used too much and will need to start over. Also, avoid getting adhesive where the hoop will press into the shirt.

5. Turn the shirt right-side out and hoop as normal. Make sure 100% of the backing is captured by the hoop so there’s even fabric tension across the entire hooped location.

Under no circumstance should you over-tighten the hoop. Never use a wrench or screwdriver to tighten it. The fabric should be taut, just tight enough so it’s held firmly. Avoid over-stretching the material as you press the inner hoop into the outer one. It’s impossible to avoid stretching the material a little – there’s physics involved here – but you can and should minimize it as much as possible. If you overstretch the fabric, it will snap back to its original size after sewing, resulting in puckering.

6. Embroider as usual, using a slightly reduced speed.

Sometimes even following those steps won’t be enough to create high-quality work. In those cases, the most successful path might be to avoid directly embroidering the product at all. Instead, consider heat-applying a die-cut patch to the garment. This won’t work for all logos, but it’s particularly suited for designs surrounded by a border. When the patch is applied with a quality press, it will look like it was directly embroidered.

Steve Freeman is the managing partner of Qdigitizing.com. He has been a professional digitizer since 1989 and is trained on Melco, Wilcom and Pulse software systems. You can reach him at steve.freeman@qdigitizing.com or (877) 733-4390.