About Embroidery Threads
If you’re lucky enough to own a JINYU embroidery machine, you have so many creative possibilities you can do for any project. We’re going to take a closer look at what kind of thread you want to choose when doing certain embroidery projects or techniques, explain why you want to choose these threads, and show you the perfect professional results! By choosing the best thread for your machine embroidery, you’ll always have the best outcome for every project you pursue.
How is thread weighed or measured?
We all see those numbers next to the thread name. Did you ever wonder what those numbers mean?
Thread is weighed or measured in 5 different ways: Weight (WT), Denier (Td or d), Tex (T), Number, and Composition.
Weight (WT) is a length measurement and is determined by measuring the length of one gram of thread. If one gram of thread is 30 meters long then it is the 30-weight thread. The higher the number the finer the thread
Denier (TD OR D)is also a thread length measurement and is the weight of 9000 meters of thread. The larger the denier number, the heavier the thread.
Tex (T) is the most consistent of the thread measurement systems. It measures 1000 meters of thread in grams. One thousand meters of thread that weighs one gram is 1Tex. The higher the Tex numbers the thicker the thread.
The Number System was developed in Japan and is called the Gunze Count system. It is used on the finer thread. It is designated as No. 50 or #50 for example. The smaller the number the heavier the thread is.
The Composition Standard was developed for the cotton thread but has also been used for polyester. BUT a cotton thread and a polyester thread with similar numbers aren’t always exactly the same. Compare cotton to cotton and polyester to polyester. Let’s look at a 30/3 thread. The first number is the same as the Number System explained above. The second number is the number of plies of thread twisted together. For our example, a 30/3 thread is a No. 30 thread with 3 plies twisted together.
Before we start embroidery we have to choose the suitable embroidery threads for our project. If we need to embroider patches, jackets, bags, or projects that will need to endure exposure for example (shoes, leather bags, and caps).
So it’s important to know the correct size or weight of thread to use for each item to be embroidered.
- Mostly we use polyester threads for most of our embroidery projects
- According to the composition slandered for most of our projects, we use 108/2 or 120/2 polyester threads
- For small letters designs, we use 75/2 polyester threads
- For lace design, we can use cotton polyester or polyester threads with 150/2 or 130/3 metallic