Free Motion Quilting Rulers and Related Gauges

Instructions

The rulers are variations of a circle, or semi-circle in 1", 2", 3", & 6". They are commonly referred to as 'clamshell. rulers. They are used with a free motion sewing machine foot, which offsets the needle by about 1/4", are are commonly used to secure fabric batting in a quilt sandwich. The gauges are 1) seam gauge, used to mark a seam offset from a sewing machine needle, as an aid to make extended alignment marks, and 2) edge gauge to mark edge offsets on larger canvas fabric projects. All labels and alignment lines are made using an engraving bit at .001 depth and are are mirror image (horizontal flip) because they are viewed through the acrylic sheet in use. I set router speed at about 2 because acrylic tends to melt at higher speeds. Inside and outside cuts are made in .05 " increments with a .005 offset until the final full depth pass when offset is set to zero. You may want to increase outside offset on the clamshell rulers by -.001 (negative .001) or more to ensure your free motion sewing machine foot (typically 0.5 " diameter) will fit easily in the end points in use. The inside cuts on the edge gauge are cut with a 1/8" bit. The holes in the 6" ruler, the Edge Gauge crossbar, and the Seam Gauge were manually drilled with a drill press, holes marked by increasing the inside offset to the maximum for an engraving bit (diam. .002) without making the cut disappear, and increasing depth to .1 ". It makes a conical impressing in the center of the circle, Same for each hole in the Seam Gauge and the Edge Gauge crossbar. I show my errors in my examples, with missing 7 in 7/8" and missing 1 in 1/2" on the Seam Gauge, and likely others I have not noticed.