Oops - marking pleats is hard!

[HarveyH]

This is only half of the pleats, so I'm going to go ahead and unpick them and re-do my pleat marking.

From the picture it looks to me the you have been doing quite well but have just missed a pleat.

Given my poor eyesight, I am always amazed that kiltmakers don't suffer this fate more often and I suspect that missing a pleat is just one of those things.

There was an earlier post about someone who marked out in tailor's chalk, but on a very white cloth like you are using I can't see that being a very good idea.

I know that Barb's book suggests not pinning out. I can't think that many people would have that many pins, but you could pin the next few pleats and check the sett before lifting needle and thread.

But I am sure that Steve will be able to guide you though his engineering method.

[bonnie heather]

This is a young dancer's kilt that I made in the Scott Green Ancient tartan, at her family's request:





The other one is for her sister in the Caledonia tartan.

[Deesquared]

Thank you so much for the pics Bonnie Heather. It really helps to see how you've pleated it. I thought I might need to split the multi-striped square down the middle of a pleat (the yellow/black/white/green/white/black/yellow section in your tartan). Looks like the best way to go with this sett.
I still haven't re-marked the pleats yet. I just unpicked them all last night, and I want to see if I can head over to Victoria to get some help from Steve first!

[Deesquared]

Here's an update on my pleating adventure:
20140211_132724.jpg

This is my second try at marking & stitching the pleats. It's going much better than the first try.
I used a combination of Steve's Engineering method and Barb's method to mark the pleats. I also marked them with thread this time rather than chalk. Took a bit of time, but was well worth the effort.
I'm very happy with how things are looking so far.
Almost halfway done with the pleats!

[Barb T]

I know that Barb's book suggests not pinning out.

In the interest of full disclosure and confession, I pin the dickens out of each and every pleat! Here's the explanation:

http://www.xmarksthescot.com/forum/f...not-pin-72250/

[The Wizard of BC]

At each sewing station at FK we have a really big pin cushion stuffed with about a gazillion pins.
It is not uncommon for us to run out of our own pins have to borrow pins from each other.

[OC Richard]

In the interest of full disclosure and confession, I pin the dickens out of each and every pleat!

Ha! Elsie wouldn't let us do!

It was the scariest part.

[Barb T]

If you read my post, you'll see that I make the analytical point that, even if you pin incredibly slowly, adding 4-5 pins to each pleat adds, at the very outside, 30 minutes to the time it takes you to make a kilt (which is about 40 hours for a beginner and 20 hours for a pro). And that's assuming that it takes you a full minute to add a few pins once you've already gotten the waist and the hip properly sized and pinned - I timed it, and, for me, it adds less than 30 seconds to each pleat.

It takes _a lot_ of practice to make a perfect pleat without pinning. If you have to take out and re-do even one pleat, you lose the time advantage that you gained by not pinning. And, I don't know about all y'all, but I HATE taking out pleats.

Anyway, back to the analysis. It takes me about 20 hours to make a kilt. If I didn't pin the pleats, _and if I didn't have to take out and re-do any of them_, I could make a kilt in 19 hours and 45 minutes (30 pleats times 30 seconds is 15 minutes). If I genuinely saved 15 minutes on each kilt (i.e., no re-done pleats), I could make 81 kilts in the time it would take me to make 80 kilts without pinning. Wow...I'd rather pin and not have to take out any pleats.

Sorry - I'm a scientist - I'd rather analyze it than to blindly accept an assertion.

[unixken]

And, I don't know about all y'all, but I HATE taking out pleats.

Hmmm... Is the plural of "y'all" really "all y'all"?

[Barb T]

yes, yes it is...