<\/p>\n
Hi Rebekah,<\/em><\/p>\n I’m thinking about trimming my silks (they are 108 inches<\/em><\/p>\n wide, which I’m realizing is just a hassle to grip). I think my instructor<\/em><\/p>\n said she trims hers to 80 inches or so – but my googling turns up<\/em><\/p>\n people saying you shouldn’t trim them because it weakens them (one<\/em><\/p>\n person thought the edge was sort of particularly strong, although<\/em><\/p>\n looking at mine, it doesn’t look that way). Do you trim\/not trim? And<\/em><\/p>\n if so, to what width?<\/em><\/p>\n Thanks!<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n What a coincidence to get your e-mail today. I just did my first trimming job today! I took about a foot off my 110 inch purple fabric that I thought was way too much to work with. The company that sells the fabric that I by from offers their services to cut the fabric thinner for you before you get it. If they can cut it down and it is safe to do so, then I\u2019m sure there\u2019s no difference in cutting it yourself. (But this is going to depend on where you get your fabric.)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I can see why people would say that cutting the fabric weakens the fabric. With less fabric around to grip, you are putting more force per square inch, and putting more force per square inch will cause the breaking strength to lower. If you cut your fabric too thin, then you are going to have a weak fabric! You are also going to have a fabric that\u2019s not very fun to grip and you probably won\u2019t want to climb it anyway. You should check (with the manufacturer) to see what the breaking strength of your fabric is and then see if they know the breaking strength of the thinner fabric.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If fabrics are made with stronger edges, then cutting would obviously weaken the integrity of the fabric and those shouldn\u2019t be cut. I\u2019ve never heard of such a fabric for aerial work, but that doesn\u2019t mean it doesn\u2019t exist! I don\u2019t sell aerial fabric, which is why the bottom line of this article is to say that you really need to be asking your manufacturer, not me. But I like to weight in …. just cuz.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As for how thin to cut it: Typically, stretchy fabrics come thin enough – I wouldn\u2019t cut those. But non-stretch fabrics are generally pretty wide (which is great for sling, etc, but not for gripping the whole fabric all the time). I cut mine down to around 98\u2019\u2019 and it still feels a little thick for gripping. I am scared to cut it too thin as I have a few friends who have done this to regret it. At the same time, I do want the width for cocooning and when i use the fabric as a sling.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I would guess 80 inches is on the cusp of as thin as you want to go with non-stretch. I didn\u2019t trust my cutting hand (plus curling fabric) with enough accuracy to get anywhere close to 80 inches. I think 90 is a better width to aim for. Anyone else out there have opinions on what width to cut the fabric to? Please comment below!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hi Rebekah, I’m thinking about trimming my silks (they are 108 inches wide, which I’m realizing is just a hassle to grip). I think my instructor said she trims hers to 80 inches or so – but my googling turns up people saying you shouldn’t trim them because it weakens them (one person thought … Continue reading “Trimming Fabric”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-equipment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85,"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5\/revisions\/85"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aerialdancing.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}