What Is Batting Joining Tape?
If you have ever finished piecing a quilt top only to realize your batting isn't quite big enough, you know the frustration. Buying a new piece of batting is expensive, and piecing scraps together the old-fashioned way — pinning and whipstitching — is slow and leaves lumpy seams that can show through your quilting.
Heat Press Batting Together Tape is a fusible cloth tape designed to solve exactly this problem. It is a 1½-inch-wide cloth tape on a 15-yard roll with a heat-activated adhesive that bonds batting edges together with a soft fuse. Once fused, the join stretches right along with the batting, so it won't distort your quilting or create a stiff ridge in the finished quilt.
The tape works on any batting fabric content — cotton, polyester, blends, and wool — and it is 100% made in the USA. Beyond joining batting pieces, quilters also use it for reinforcement: stabilizing stretch fabrics, backing stretchy areas of a garment or bag, and patching.
How to Use It
Joining batting with fusible tape is simple, but iron settings matter more than anything else, so always test on a scrap of your batting first.
- Butt the edges together. Lay your two batting pieces on a flat pressing surface with their edges touching, not overlapping. For a wide addition (for example, extending a 93-inch quilt batting wider), place weights on either side of the seam to keep everything flat.
- Cut a length of tape to span the full join and lay it centered over the seam, adhesive side down.
- Set your iron. If your iron has a Teflon soleplate, a low cotton setting fuses the tape. For irons without a Teflon plate, follow the batting-specific settings below.
- Press to fuse. Use an up-and-down pressing motion (don't slide) until the adhesive sets. You can finish with a low shot of steam, holding the iron just above the tape.
- Let it cool. The batting may look flat right after pressing, but it springs back to its loft as it cools.
Iron Settings by Batting Type
These are the manufacturer's starting points — always run a test strip first:
- 100% polyester batting: low setting (high synthetic), up-and-down motion until the glue sets. A low shot of steam from above helps finish the bond.
- Synthetic blend battings: test first; a wool setting usually works well.
- Cotton or natural-fiber battings: use the low cotton guidance, adjusting down if you see any flattening or scorching.
Practical Tips
- Test every combination. Different batting brands and fiber contents respond differently to heat. A 6-inch test strip costs you nothing and saves you from a ruined piece of batting.
- Butt, don't overlap. Overlapping batting edges create a bulky double layer that can telegraph through your quilt top. Butt edges give an invisible join.
- Join on the batting, not the quilt. Fuse your batting pieces before layering your quilt sandwich — pressing a fused seam into a pieced top risks distorting the top.
- Save the scraps. Leftovers from trimming a quilt's batting are perfect candidates for joining. A couple of taped seams can assemble a full quilt's worth of batting from pieces you'd otherwise throw away.
- Think beyond quilts. The tape doubles as a reinforcement strip: stabilize shoulder seams in stretchy garments, back a stretchy bag panel, or patch a worn spot on batting or fleece.
Storage and Care
Store the roll in a cool, dry place away from direct heat — the adhesive is heat-activated, so a hot car or a sunny shelf can partially activate it and reduce its grip. Keep the roll in its original packaging to protect the adhesive surface from dust, and avoid touching the sticky side with your fingers, since skin oils can weaken the bond. Once fused into a quilt, the join holds through normal quilting and washing.
Project Ideas
- Size up a batting remnant for a lap quilt or wall hanging by fusing two or more scraps together.
- Piece wide backing batting for a king-size quilt from two smaller pieces instead of buying a specialty wide roll.
- Reinforce a tote bag lining by fusing strips of tape along stress points.
- Extend a table runner or place mat where you need just a few more inches of loft.
Shop the Heat Press Batting Together Tape (White) at Linda's Electric Quilters.
