The Sewing Place
The Emporia => In the wardrobe => Patterns Discussion => Topic started by: sewingj on October 08, 2020, 15:55:47 PM
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I`ve printed off my Sinclair Sandy tunic but could do with a bit of help assembling the pages. I`ve only used one other pdf pattern and did find it hard lining up the pages accurately and keeping the whole pattern "square". The two options seem to be glue sticks or sticky tape but I found both of those tricky if I needed to reposition a page.
Any advice/tips would be appreciated
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Fran wrote a tutorial here (https://thesewingplace.org.uk/index.php/topic,6388.msg101336.html#msg101336).
I use sellotape, although masking tape does seem like a good idea for repositioning. I have my sellotape in one of those heavy dispensers which means that I can take a piece off with one hand, and it also holds down one of the pieces I'm taping.
I also do tape the whole lot - one row, then adding to it one piece at a time, but again, I think Fran's method is probably better.
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If you are using sticky tape I strongly recommend using Scotch magic tape.
I don’t usually go for a branded product, always look for cheaper alternatives but I find magic tape invaluable for sticking patterns together.
As Acorn says use a dispenser so you can do it one handed.
I try to use a small piece of tape to start with and I don’t press it down too firmly, then when I am happy that things are lined up ok I add longer lengths of tape and press down well.
It’s a bit faffy this way but gives you a good chance of getting things correct.
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I use tape. I think I want to buy a dispenser though because it would make life easier. I would be afraid of making a mess with glue. I used to tape the whole thing but now I only tape each pattern piece. It seems to end up more accurate that way.
Also for the actual sheets I use the rotary cutter to trim the sides I'm taping on top of the piece that already has an edge ... if that makes sense.
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I don't stick the sheets together. I trace on to a sheet of tracing paper ( I use Burda pattern paper). I start with the top LH corner and trace the pattern piece and the corner registration marks. I line up the registration marks of the next sheet and trace and so on.
I only use pdfs for tops so they aren't too big. I wouldn't bother to use them at all if there wasn't an alternative to sticking the sheets together as I couldn't face doing that.
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@Ploshkin I haven't tried that method yet. I think I will. So do you just do one pattern piece at a time?
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I use either Scotch Magic tape (cheap bulk buy from Amazon) or Tesco glue sticks, as the mood takes me. Yesterday I used glue for a Jalie jacket pdf. I find either is easy to reposition for a short while after the initial stick-on. I try to be as precise as possible but only for pages where that matters (ie within the same pattern piece). My 50gsm paper seems easier to position than the 80gsm I used formerly but maybe I've just had more practice?
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@sewingj: I use
(https://i.imgur.com/25Ts6Ds.jpg)
which lifts off even from pattern tissue, although you have to be gentle. You could also use small sticky notes.
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@mudcat it depends what the pattern is and how many sheets there are.
I keep the tile layout in view for reference and do a row at a time if I need the whole sheet but if it is a pattern where I don't need to use all the pieces then I will just do the pieces I need.
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Thanks everyone. I have some Magic Tape and masking tape so will have a play tomorrow
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Another magic tape fan. I got through loads of it at college! I also bulk buy from Amazon after I found several years ago that I couldn’t get the large reels in any shops near me.
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Yet another Magic Tape fan!
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Magic tape and lightweight (50 gsm) paper works best for me. That reminds me I'm almost out of it having printed off the Sinclair Sandy Knit Tunic yesterday.
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I have used Magic tape but I find ordinary Sellotape to be fine. A tape dispenser is a must. I don't tape together the whole pattern. Instead I construct each pattern piece one at a time. It's much less unwieldy that way and easier to keep things aligned.
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Has anyone tried McCall or Butterick patterns as pdf downloads from the US website? I'm used to Stylearc pdfs where the patterns usually have lots of clean lines and instructions for printing and sticking together - even if the garment constuction instructions are 'sparse'.
I ordered Butterick 6784, a new Katherine Tilton paper dress pattern in a Butterick sale on the US site but it was out of stock so I've just bought it as a pdf. Of course being a Tilton pattern it is full of fussy pattern pieces. There are 2 sheets with a total of 100 A4 pages. Like me my printer is somewhat elderly and is likely to object to printing more than a couple of pages at a time so that's an all day job!
Stylearc patterns include a 10cm square so you can check you are printing things the right size but I don't see anything like that in the Butterick pattern. I assume you just set things to 'print exact size'. Wish me luck!
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I've had a McCalls pdf, but it was for a baby top, so it wasn't too challenging! It worked well.
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I bought some kids patterns (McCall's I believe) a few years ago because I was thinking to make some kids clothes from my quilting cottons to donate to one of the back to school organizations that disperses to children in need. At the time you had to work with a third party to do the download. I don't recall the name of it ...maybe SewingPatterns.com.
Anyway, I thought PDFs for children's clothing would be only a few pages and I was completely shocked at how many pages there were. I still have them though I only ended up making one thing because they all took more fabric than I had anticipated.
Big4 has some work to do with making the PDF files a little more space efficient. 100 pages would be torture. :S
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@Tamnymore if the download folder has an AO file I would be sending it to a copyshop like Netprinter or Patternsy. (Patternsy will print just certain layers if you ask them). Anything over 30 or so pages is too much faff for me.
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I've just looked at the McCalls pattern, which is for a top for a baby up to 18 months old, and it has 21 pages with no test square. I compared it with an Ellie and Mac top, for ages 12 months to 14 years, and that one has only 9 pattern pages, and has a 1" and a 4cm square!!
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Has anyone tried McCall or Butterick patterns as pdf downloads from the US website? I'm used to Stylearc pdfs where the patterns usually have lots of clean lines and instructions for printing and sticking together - even if the garment constuction instructions are 'sparse'.
I ordered Butterick 6784, a new Katherine Tilton paper dress pattern in a Butterick sale on the US site but it was out of stock so I've just bought it as a pdf. Of course being a Tilton pattern it is full of fussy pattern pieces. There are 2 sheets with a total of 100 A4 pages. Like me my printer is somewhat elderly and is likely to object to printing more than a couple of pages at a time so that's an all day job!
Stylearc patterns include a 10cm square so you can check you are printing things the right size but I don't see anything like that in the Butterick pattern. I assume you just set things to 'print exact size'. Wish me luck!
I bought the same pattern a few days ago. It actually didn't take too long to put together but I did run out of tape! No scale square, as you noted, but my mono laser printer handles big print runs without distortion or slipping so mine looks ok. Check for the blank pages that don't need to be printed, it will break up the printing into blocks, might help give the printer a rest.
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I bought some tape that is a bit like paper to do a small piece of a pocket. It worked quite well but since then I've bought the magic tape. However it was just for odd bits and the main I'm afraid I went the cheat's way out and had it printed. The last two I've had printed by the Avid Seamstress, the paper was better, not as thick as some of them.
If there are a lot of sizes within a pattern I chop them out of Adobe so I can usually manage with just one piece of paper.