This Spring Needle from Gingham Square is ideal for freehand and free-motion quilting, embroidery, sewing and monogramming. Use on its own or with a free-motion guide foot. Size 75. This needle is used for free motion quilting. Generally you would have the fabric hooped, and no presser foot on the machine (although you still want to make sure the pressure foot lever is in the down position in order to have proper tension) and then you sew. You will move the fabric, and the purpose of the spring is so that when the needle enters the fabric, the fabric is compressed so that the thread will loop properly underneath for a good quality stitch. Without the spring, the fabric bounces up and down with the needle and you will get a lot of skipped stitches. Recommendation: whenever you do free motion sewing - try to run the machine quickly - so that the needle is in and out of the fabric as quickly as possible. This will help keep the needle from bending as you move the fabric around. If you do break the needle - you can remove the spring mechanism from this needle and slide it onto another needle. I always suggest trying free motion sewing without any thread in the machine at first - just so that you can get the feel of moving the fabric around smoothly while the machine runs.