Product Review: Is the Velocity 200IR the Perfect Iron?

I take irons seriously. This little-mentioned (but hard working) appliance can make your sewing time fun and productive or frustrating and unproductive (i.e. ruined fabric). So here is an iron review that you want to read…

I have tried LOTS of different irons, and quite frankly, I didn’t immediately jump when Reliable asked if I wanted to review their new Velocity 200IR. It looked completely normal. What could be so different? Well, I’m jumping for joy now. How about an iron that delivers on every promise and quietly does an excellent job so you can sew more? That’s what I’m talking about. Oh, and since that time I came to love the OVO Travel Iron too.

So I have to tell you a side story… I set this up in my studio the day I received it. Then the next morning after I had left the house to take my kids to school, my husband called me on my cell like it was some kind of emergency. He had to ask where this new iron came from… he was in love with the Velocity 200IR. I’m not promising that your family will iron their own clothes if you provide the right iron… but maybe you’ll be as lucky as I am and they will! 

UPDATE: The Velocity 200IR has been replaced by the Velocity 230IR.

The first thing I noticed about the Reliable 200IR, is the steam pump that comes on when I touch the handle… wow! This iron has 2 heating elements, which means that there is a separate heating tank for the water. Water turns into steam before it reaches the sole plate so no drips or leaks! There are three levels of steam (none, low, and high), all of which are steady and very… reliable. High steam is perfect for fusing interfacing and getting out tough creases. I found low steam to be great for everything else. I don’t use steam for quilt piecing, so it’s nice that I can turn it off.

The sole plate is smooth and beautiful. And I’m happy to report that after 2 months of heavy use it is still perfectly clean. Sadly, my last iron stained almost immediately, but not the case here!

Besides the manual, it came with this handy little water jug that tells me just how much water I’ll need to fill up the iron. The pour spout means no more spills on my ironing board!

And it has the one feature that always makes me a happy sewist – the ability to disable the auto-turn off! I can’t stand it when I am busily sewing a quilt top and then I turn around to press and my iron is cold. All I have to do is hold the steam button down for 8 seconds, the iron will beep, and I know that we are in ‘pro-mode’. Or at least that’s what I call it!

Oh, and of course it gets hot, hot, hot. That goes without saying. I couldn’t recommend an iron that didn’t. 🙂

So, is it perfect? Well, nobody’s perfect. But the only thing that I could find to complain about is that the steam on/off buttons are really easy to accidentally press when I’m ironing. But that also means they are really easy to reach with my thumb when I want to press them. So it is pretty darn close to the perfect iron in my opinion.

Visit the Reliable website to read what they say about the Velocity 200IR, or if you are an Amazon shopper you can see it here.

Happy sewing!

p.s. Keep shopping smart with all my other sewing product reviews too!