# Shirts not straight on Hoopmaster



## BeaBu (Jun 16, 2011)

Hello. I was hired by a company 1 1/2 months ago to do embroidery on their new Tajima 6 head machine. It is a new business for them and I have never done embroidery. We have a hoopmaster set up and we are not able to get the shirt logos straight with the hoops. We have to have the hoops loose enough so we can adjust it to look straight. We are producing crooked logos. We have more of a problem with sizes X-Large and bigger. I went to the training for this machine and the trainer said the placements should be straight if you use the hoopmaster. We can't figure out what we are doing wrong. 

Thanks, 

Nancy P.


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## Liberty (Jul 18, 2006)

I'm assuming you are using the HoopMaster shirt board, not the freearm? And also the fixture that holds the top hoop straight while you push it down?

How are you determining that they are not straight?

When you pull the shirt over the board, just let it drape, don't pull down on the front of the shirt. You should be able to approximate the shoulder seams across the top edge of the board and just let it drape down the front.

I always prefered the old "Perfect Hooper" as I felt it did a better job of simulating the person wearing it but the hoopmaster works good. I've had operators though that over think it and pull at teh shirt every which direction to the point where the shirt isn't really straight any more.

Take an old tee shirt, with a straight edge and a chalk wheel draw a line straight across the shirt from the bottom of the two armpits. Assuming the t-shirt is fairly well constructed, this will give you a straight line across the front of the shirt. Then you can pull the tee over the HoopMaster in your usualy method and see what you are doing to that straight line. At least that will give you an idea of wether or not you are lining the shirts up straight.

My suspicion is that if you use the Hopmaster correctly, they area actually straight when you are hooping them but your confidence in this is broken and you are trying to make adjustment visually. Try trusting the hopmaster.

On the plus size shirts though, they do tend to fall off the edge of the shoulder form so that may be aggravating things.

Just trust that if you put the shirt on the board and the vertical center is going straight up and down, and you get the hoop in at a right angle to that vertical center, the logo will be straight.


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## Liberty (Jul 18, 2006)

One other thought, on the really big shirts like a 3XL, you can use the extender board if you have one.

On our older Perfect Hooper we sometimes use the jacket board on the larger shirts.


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## BeaBu (Jun 16, 2011)

Thanks, we will try that.


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## BeaBu (Jun 16, 2011)

Thanks Mark. Working much better. I need to stop being anal because it doesn't work.


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## Liberty (Jul 18, 2006)

You are welcome... glad it helped.


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## myfinishingtouch (Nov 21, 2009)

If the shirt has buttons or a placket make sure they are running vertical on the Hoopmaster. Then take the left plastic arm of the hoop holder and (without the hoop on the holder) press it down and make sure a seam is displaced from the plastic the same amount at the top and the bottom of the plastic arm.

If you are putting logos above a pocket and you don't have the pocket aligner...get one. It's practically impossible not to have a perfectly aligned logo to the top of the pocket because the pocket aligner has marked lines which you simply line up with the top of the pocket (pocket aligner rests inside the hoop). You touch the hoop with aligner in it down onto the shirt making sure the top of the pocket lines up with one of the lines on the pocket aligner.

The shirt extender is only so so. You can't really move the mounting bracket any farther to the side when using the extender but it does help with the drape of the larger shirts. Truthfully, though you don't really want the logo too far to the side, even on 3XL shirts any way.


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