shaverg

Me too, works great and has for over 25 years.

I now use the word tear, just because I know the word rip, really upsets a lot of people. Although between me and you, I rip too, LOL. You just have to do it easy and not really fast. Always glad to meet another ripper.

shaverg

Try a small area. I just did it for a fussy (cut) tear and each large flower tore in exactly the same spot, perfect. It was Kona Bay fabric.

wishiwerequilting

Is this a border stripe fabric where the stripes run along the lengthwise grain?
If so i would not tear but cut with a scissor carefully along the length, remembering to allow for your 1/4" seam allowance.

Sometimes on a screen print, the stripe is not printed exactly on grain and even the tearing will not line you up properly.

If you have borders to cut on a lengthwise grain and you want to use a rotary ruler and rotary cutter, just open the fabric up and press it. Then put the selvage edges one on top of the other so that the fabric is being folded again, but this time be totally sure that the fabric is flat with no puckers (which means the cut edges may not line up but you know your selvages are straight, which is making the grain straight). Then you can cut in any direction and you will not have curves.
So to cut along the length, you fold and make sure the selvages are lined up and then fold again and make sure the selvages are lined up perfectly and you should get a nice straight cut.
I would not do that with a striped fabric, however, just in case, as I said above, the print is at all off grain.
Hope this helps!

Rettie V. Grama

That cutting a length is a difficult job. Depending on the fabric, I as another blogger stated, tear. So I have a few little strings, I just snip them off. If it doesn't tear well, I go to the store and buy matching binding or find a color coordinated material for the binding, bring it home, then tear away. LOL

Rettie V. Grama

How many layers do you fold at one time and what width do you make your cut?

Rettie V. Grama

Hey,Ms. Sew Crafty, I like this idea. I have a T-square.

wishiwerequilting

Most of the time if you have a length of fabric, it won't need to be more than 3 yards (unless you are making a huge king quilt). So the most important step is to get your selvage edges perfectly lined up and straight, one on top of the other, and then press the fabric.
Then you fold as many times as you need to in order to get the fabric under your ruler. If you are just using a regular fabric with no particular stripe that you want to follow, you can get border cuts of up to 10" out of a width of fabric. Most borders are 6" or less usually.
You can use a 6" x 24" ruler, but you will need a large 60 mm (not 45 mm) blade in your cutter in order to go through all the layers, and it must be a sharp blade with no nicks.
I prefer to use a June Taylor Shape Cut Plus for this process. It is a ruler with laser cut groves for your blade to glide in and it does not slip like a regular ruler may. I think if you look at their web site, you can see how it would be used.
http://www.junetailor.com/shapecutvido.htm
If I were cutting a border stripe, however, i would definitely use a scissor. As tedious as that is, you really need to make sure you get your 1/4" seam allowance added on to the stripe you want. I suppose you could use a rotary cutter, but it would have to be single thickness of fabric, and done carefully.

Granny Peggy

Sometimes the salvage is tight so I cut off the salvage then fold it several times and get a nice straight cut before I begin to cut my strips for binding or borders.

Honey

Me too.

quiltmom04

Yep, I tear too.