Have you had this problem with "darning" on the machine

I don't have the best machine by far.  To darn I have to put a plastic plate over the dog feeds because they don't drop.  The instructions do not indicate any darning foot to be used which I'm guessing is due the extra height of the plate that a foot wouldn't fit. 

Anyway, when I darn it is skipping stitches so when I try to quilt free-motion it's skipping stitches and really making a mess of things.  Sometimes even pulls all the thread down underneath the project.  But the funny thing is that as soon as I put a foot on and take the darning plate off there is no skipping and not pulling to underneath even with all the same settings.  I don't get it.  I can only guess that the pressure of a foot would help, but I can't put a foot on.

Now even stranger, I had done some practising free-motion stuff on an old quilt I made and it was working fine but at one point I broke a needle and since than I've had problems but only with "darning".  I have clean the lint etc out from underneath where the bobbin goes and oiled the machine, but still no improvement.  Any ideas?  Has this happened to anyone else?

I'm so sad that I can't darn as I have my first really big quilt that I wanted to do free-motion.

I'm not an expert, but in my experience the darning foot is used to gently hold the fabric in place so that the machine can complete a stitch.  When the needle is back in it's highest position, the foot is raised as well so that the fabric can be moved in the direction of your choice.  You should be able to find a darning foot for your machine even with the plastic plate covering your feed dogs.  There are many sizes out there and you should be able to find one to fit your machine for under $10. 

If you do not want to buy a darning foot and since you wrote that you have FMQ before without one, I would suggest playing around with your tension.  I think you have to tighten your tension fro FMQ, but I'm not sure.  Good luck!

I wonder if you used a stabilizer of some sort beneath your work if that would help with the pulling of the fabric downwards.  I'm not much of a machine quilter, but when I've done small projects, I've put a layer of tissue paper under my work and had good results.  The tissue paper is really easy to pull off afterwards too.