Thread Calculations for Your Embroidery Machine

When you are about to start a machine embroidery design, the first thing to remember is how long an embroidery spool will last. An average spool of thread can typically last for 2-4 hours of machine embroidery design time. However, this varies depending on the type of thread used and quality of your sewing machine. So you should always take into consideration these factors when calculating how much embellishment thread you will need for your next embroidery project.This content also has some reference value for Eagle digitizing.

How many stitches per yard of embroidery thread?

On average, one yard of embroidery thread can be embroidered with 182 stitches. This translates to 199 stitches per meter of machine-embroidered thread.

Here are a few factors that affect how many stitches can actually be put on a one-yard line.

1. Stitch type and length

Embroidery designs consist of different stitches, each using a different amount of thread. For example, a wide satin stitch uses more thread than a narrow satin stitch or a short stitch.

Sulky and several other thread brands estimate the average stitch length to be 4-5 mm. This doesn't take into account thread wastage, jumpers, etc., which I'll mention later.

2. Thread tension

The spool and top line tension are finely balanced on the embroidery machine.

Although the general rule is that the bottom 1/3 thread of the design should be the thread axis and the top 2/3 thread of the satin stitch, tension imbalances can cause a different amount of thread to be used than intended.

3. Fabric thickness

The machine embroidery thread must travel farther through the thick fabric than the thin fabric to connect with the thread axis.

While the difference between embroidering on thin fabric is negligible for small designs, this difference can add up to running out of thread faster than expected during large designs or mass production.

4. Skip needle cutting and waste wire

How many jumpers each design has and whether your machine cuts the jumpers (and if not, how long the jump is) will affect the use of the thread.

In addition, each time you stop the color of the thread, you must clip the thread near the spool and pull the excess thread out through the needle. That's almost a foot of line wasted at a time!

How long does an embroidery spool last?

With the above conversion in mind, you can calculate how long a spool or cone of any size will last.

For those who hate math, on average, you can again conclude:

A 220 yard (200 m) reel can last about 40,000 stitches

The 550 yard (500 m) reel can sew nearly 100,000 stitches

1100 yd (1000 m) wire coil can last about 200,000 stitches

The 5,500-yard (5,000-meter) tapered thread can last nearly 1 million stitches.

Instead, if you need to determine how many 5,500-yard cones (5,000 m) you will need to complete your order, use the following calculation:

(Number of blanks x number of design stitches) / 1,000,000 = Number of cones required

For example, if you need to embroider 10,000 stitch designs on 1,000 different shirts, calculate as follows: (1,000 x 10,000) / 1,000,000 = 10 tapered threads required.

If you meticulously keep track of how much machine embroidery thread is left on the embroidery spool, you can keep track by subtracting the amount of calculated thread for each design from the total amount of thread on the spool.

Keep track of this number by writing it on a label at the top or bottom of the spool and updating it as the thread is used.

That way you don't have to estimate how many threads are left on the used spool!

I hope you enjoy this crazy journey through the embroidery lines to calculate the math involved.

Now you know how to find exactly the number of threads needed for your next embroidery design, and know how long your spool or thread cone will last!