HIT THE DECK!

[gene]

Howdy,

When you make a deck cover, you machine sew the face fabric to the decking material.

When you hand stitch the deck cover to furniture decks, do you staple the sides of the decking cover (the seam where the face fabric is machine sewn to the decking material) to the sides of the furniture before you hand stitch? Or do you hand stitch and then pull the fabric where the seam is to the sides and staple?

I feel like hand stitching decks is a lot harder and takes up more of my time than it should.

Thanks,

gene

[sofadoc]

I hand stitch first, then staple the seam.

[MinUph]

I generally put twines at each end, staple them in place. then stitch in place and pull the temporary twines out last. Sometimes if the stitching pull is used I will extend this each end and staple in place. Both these steps are to take the slack out of the sewing area before sewing it down. Hand sewing is a bit time consuming but the best way when called for. I had a guy working at the shop for awhile that hot glued the seam down to the old decking. He didn't last to long.

[sofadoc]

I had a guy working at the shop for awhile that hot glued the seam down to the old decking. He didn't last to long.

This scenario makes me curious about something.

As the shop owner, do you allow your upholsterers some latitude to use their own techniques? Or do you make them all adhere to a standard set of techniques?

Back in the day, we gave new hires a certain amount of trust at first. It usually didn't take long for them to betray that trust.

[MinUph]

  Right now I have one seamstress and one bench man (upholsterer) other than myself. My sewer has 30 years in and the bench guy about the same. They are both good at their trades. My secretary is also good at her job. I let them do their things for the most part. I do require a quality product and that has never been an issue with these employees. I oversee everything but not in their face. That said If I were to bring someone in that did not do a proper job in my opinion I would first try and train them better and if that didn't work either would they.
  Having been in this trade for the length of time I know the old ways and the new ways. I know what is right and what is a short cut. I don't want to short change any customer even if they wouldn't know it. So my shop's products have to be as good as can be. I am really lucky that my people are as good as they are and I like the fact that I don't have to hover over them.

[Darren Henry]

The guy who trained me buttoned his decks on. Number 22 buttons on strings along the seam pulled down and stapled to the frame like tuftiing.

[sofadoc]

The guy who trained me buttoned his decks on. Number 22 buttons on strings along the seam pulled down and stapled to the frame like tuftiing.

I've seen a lot of decks that were button tufted on. It works fine. I do it sometimes on open arm chairs where all 4 sides of the deck is exposed.

But just for a straight run across the front of a sofa deck, hand stitching is actually quicker IMO.

[byhammerandhand]

I had a guy working at the shop for awhile that hot glued the seam down to the old decking. He didn't last to long.

This scenario makes me curious about something.

As the shop owner, do you allow your upholsterers some latitude to use their own techniques? Or do you make them all adhere to a standard set of techniques?

Back in the day, we gave new hires a certain amount of trust at first. It usually didn't take long for them to betray that trust.

I think the people who specialize in quality programs (six-sigma, etc.) would frown on this.  First you standardize (good or bad), then improve.   If you (as an organization) are not doing things consistently, you can't standardize and improve quality.

[gene]

I tried once to use the tufting needle once thinking it might be faster and easier. It did not give me a nice clean stitching line. Maybe I did it wrong.

gene

[sofadoc]

I use a straight tufting needle to anchor the corners of a T-cushion deck, then I use my big curve needle the rest of the way.

[sofadoc]

  First you standardize (good or bad), then improve.   If you (as an organization) are not doing things consistently, you can't standardize and improve quality.

I would agree that standardization is the best way in most any business. But it's difficult to enforce in the upholstery business.

Any time we discuss a specific method or technique on forums like this one, we get about as many different opinions as there are upholsterers.

If I opened a shop in another state right now and hired 5 veteran upholsterers from various regions of the country, they would all have different techniques. And maybe I'm wrong about this, but I'll bet that all 5 would boldly proclaim that THEIR method is the only true definitive one.

Sounds like Paul has things pretty standardized in his shop, but even still he occasionally has one knucklehead come in trying to hot glue the decks.

Watch some YouTube videos about sewing a cushion or hand-tying springs. The methods are all over the map.

Standardization in the upholstery business? Yeah they have that. They're called factories.

[byhammerandhand]

After moving to the country last summer, I'm going to start back up beekeeping after not being able to have them for 20+ years.   At one recent presentation, the speaker said, "Ask any three beekeepers and you'll get 6 opinions."