Re: My jeans are torn: damage control...

seanspotatobusiness <sean.van.der.smythe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote in
news:1191754335.972314.306980@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:

My jeans tore at the knee and the tear has been getting
wider. I repaired them with a piece of string:
http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/7849/picture021ca3.jpg
but as you can see, this has caused the formation of two
new holes (circled in green); it's getting worse! I
basically just punched the holes in with a pencil and
pulled the string through with a paperclip. I put the new
holes down to a lack of reinforcement and my new idea is
that inserting eyelets (you can get an eyelet device
cheaply on ebay) will give the reinforcement needed to make
it work. Is this doomed to fail too?

<snicker? bonus points for ingenuity anyway.
yes, just setting grommets for the string would also fail,
for a couple reasons. first, the fabric is thin enough to tear
at the knee, which means it's too thin to hold the eyelets
without tearing/popping. second, lacing isn't the best method
of fixing a hole in clothing. you need a patch.

Some jeans are bought with tears in - what stops these
tears from just getting bigger and bigger?

holes as a "design feature" are reinforced by either
stitching around the area to keep the hole from expanding or
sometimes interfaced underneith with an iron on patch, also to
keep the hole from spreading.
spending lots of money on purposely damaged clothes is pretty
stupid. as you have learned, you can do it yourself, and
*those* type of holes/tears are a lot more genuine.

Previous sewing experience: I made a pair of awful (awful)
shorts at school which were promptly thrown away.

with a machine or by hand? were you taught how to fit shorts?
i'd guess not, which is why they were awful...
it's possible to sew a knee patch on by machine, but i prefer
hand sewing (i do machine sew patches going on the ***
though). if you have spare denim, you can cut a patch from
that big enough to cover the tear *and* the weakened fabric
around it. if you just cover the tear, a patch will rip around
the edges too. if you don't have denim, any decent weight
fabric will do. i've used everything from quilting cottons to
fake fur...
i make my patches twice as long as i need & fold in half (so
there's 2 more layers over the hole). fold the edges under as
you sew (or sew right sides together almost all the way
around, turn right side out & sew onto the knee) so you don't
get fraying of the patch.
or you can try iron-on patches, but i don't like them. too
stiff & they fall off if you don't follow the directions
exactly.
my favorite pair of jeans in college was a pair i bought used
& i patched & patched & patched... but once the patches needed
patches, i quit. there's resourceful & there's wasting your
time. once the patches start wearing out, it's time to bid
them farewell.
lee
.